


Negotiation

by femme4jack, fractalserpentine, HopeofDawn, Sakiku



Series: Domesticus [12]
Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers (Marvel Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alien Culture, Domestic Fluff, Dubious Consent, Other, Plug and Play Sexual Interfacing, Tentacles, Warning: contains Ratbat
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-25
Updated: 2016-04-03
Packaged: 2018-02-06 05:39:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 30,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1846390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/femme4jack/pseuds/femme4jack, https://archiveofourown.org/users/fractalserpentine/pseuds/fractalserpentine, https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopeofDawn/pseuds/HopeofDawn, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sakiku/pseuds/Sakiku
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Humans, like most organics, are poorly suited to environmental extremes.  All humans should be kept in a protective enclosure when not in use, ideally with one or two additional members of their species.  Isolation can lead to erratic functioning, and it is inadvisable to allow humans to roam freely, due to environmental hazards and possible organic contamination of living areas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The first portion of this chapter was originally posted in 'Fascination'; it is reposted here to help readers track this particular storyline. :)
> 
> The rape/noncon archive warning is for the overall themes of this story-verse, which is neck deep in consent issues. We'll continue to use this archive warning on every installment due to the nature of the story-verse. Please heed the warnings if this isn't your thing.
> 
> Beta by femme4jack!

“Oh frag,” said Buzzsaw, beak clacking in irritation as he peered into the human’s tank.

It wasn’t there. Not under the scraps of metalmesh, not hiding in the water cube, nowhere. “Told ya,” squeaked Ratbat, fluttering by behind the large tank.

“Yeah? Well you could’a told me a joor ago, back when it was escaping!” Fraggity frag frag. He’d been gone for such a little while -- how could this have happened?

“I was recharging,” said Ratbat haughtily. “‘Sides which, it wasn’t my job.”

“Not your job -- awwk!” Buzzsaw flapped his wings in dismay. He hopped back and forth in front of the tank, peering around the corners as if the human had possibly hidden itself there. It hadn’t. One of the fuel cubes that the Boss had dropped inside, before heading off to report, was missing -- either the human had fueled itself a great deal, or... “Look here, you little glitch, I--”

Buzzsaw snapped his beak shut as Flipsides’s comm drifted over the cohort channel. _//Laserbeak just told me -- this is so great! I didn’t think we’d get one as well -- Prowl hasn’t even left his quarters with the other one, yet, so they must be pretty interesting. You probably have this already, but I looked up the humans’ language pack. Has it been talking much? I just can’t wait to see it!//_

Buzzsaw’s wings drooped. _//...Uh. No, not much,//_ he hedged awkwardly, accepting the language data. Frag and double frag. A glint caught his optic -- a tiny, wavy bit of metal, doubled over and jammed into the cube’s control chip. He had no idea how the human had reached the thing, let alone known where and how to interrupt the containment fields. The human had planned its escape, frag the creature, and it was gonna haveta be Buzzsaw who broke the news to poor Flipsides.

Or, yanno, not. _//Hey Flipsides, I gotta go, ok? Bye!//_

The flightframe fixed a baleful optic on Ratbat. “We’ve got to go find it,” he said.

“What!” Ratbat scrabbled at the underside of a wall perch, wings flailing, nearly missing his landing. “What’s this ‘we’ thing!”

“You wanna explain to everyone how we let the human escape? You know the mechkin are gonna want to see it. And the Boss ain’t gonna be happy when he comes to interrogate it, and--”

“Again with the ‘we’!” Ratbat made a rude noise. Buzzsaw was right, though -- Rumble was gonna be madder than a razorsnake. Frenzy had gotten to see the human all during the flight from Kalis and had been just fascinated, tapping on the cube walls to watch its reactions, until the boss had scooped him up. “And anyway, how are we going to find it?”

Buzzsaw hop-stepped around perimeter of the low table, peering over the edge. Nope, no human. It could have at least left a trail of fuel cube bits or something, but no, inconsiderate creature. He could smell the thing’s pheromones, but it wasn’t like a flightframe had the hardware for olfactory tracking. No visuals, no trail -- Buzzsaw slumped. Then he called Ravage.

 

*********

 

Deep behind the walls, balanced precariously between three torso-thick pipes, Maggie listened. It was hard to hear anything over the pounding of her own heart, but the scrabbling noises and the screech-click of the robot-animals’ speech seemed to be retreating.

It was hard to tell, though, between the echoes and the dark.

Just her luck -- and all her luck ran bad. Get the bright idea to run away from Earth to keep from being some bloke’s fuck bunny, and she ends up some giant robot’s instead. Fuckin’ rod up the clacker, and who the hell could take that day in, day out? Hacking the cage had taken some work the first time. It was smooth sailing the second, and easy as piss the third. Trouble was, getting caught was even easier. Maggie wasn’t sure what they had used to track her down the first time, but being a organic critter in a world full of metal probably had something to do with it. Spending a couple of days in the vents, drinking foul-tasting condensation from the chilled piping, hadn’t done her any favors either.

But that’d been months ago. This time she was smarter about it. She had some food, some improvised tools, and a piece of that weird metal burlap to carry it all in, and with any luck she wouldn’t have to cross any open spaces where she might get picked up by the perv machines. Or their metal animals.

God. Stuck with that bloke in a small carry-cube, all knackered out and worried, handled by all kinds of mechs she didn’t know--and then the guy gets snatched out of the cube, and if that wasn't bad enough this rooting giant snake comes slithering out of the shadows, a shining, knife-scaled horror twenty feet long, coiling up around the cage. Given the stories she’d heard from the rest of the poor blokes who’d been dragged out and sold ….

No, best not to think about it. Focus on the now. Figure out where she’d gone wrong in her other escape attempts, and then do it *better*.

Shifting her makeshift rucksack a little higher on her shoulder, she began picking her way carefully deeper into the walls. Even after--what, a year? Two? Fuck, she didn’t even know anymore--even after way too long on Cybertron, it was still mind-boggling how *big* everything was. This place was nothing like Earth, and was full of alien robots that ranged in size from a good four to five meters high to a hundred meters or more.  And everything around them was scaled to match, which could work to her benefit. She could take advantage of all the little nooks and crannies in the maze of conduits in the robots’ buildings, if she was quick and quiet … and she was more than smart enough to learn all the hidden trails running under and through their cities.

“Just another mouse in the walls,” she murmured, trying to enjoy the black humor of that thought. Anything to distract her from the fact that she was scuttling around in the dark and the dirt on an alien world unimaginably far from home. Reaching a gap, she peered down into the endless darkness below, then glanced up. There was no way of telling how far down that drop was. Above, however, was a tangle of thick wiring that she was pretty sure she could climb… and the black arch of another passageway. She would just have to be careful; if she fell down into that void--Maggie shivered, and very carefully did not look down again. Climbing over a blunted metal protrusion, she clambered on to the wiring, grimy toes and fingers searching for holds.

“Alright, Maggie. Let’s do this thing.” Her eyes had adjusted as much as they could to the darkness, but there wasn’t much light to work with -- some of the wiring had dim luminescent spots along the lengths, but those were more creepy than useful. She mostly had to work by feel, letting her fingers search out the next handhold, groping out where the wires stopped and empty space began.

Halfway across, her improvised rucksack shifted, its weight pulling her off to one side--she lurched, yelped, then threw herself forward, flattening herself as much as she could against the cables, heart pounding. She stayed there, praying that her perch would hold, trying to get her panic under control. The cabling was reassuringly solid underneath her; after a few more panicky moments, she grit her teeth and pulled herself forward, fear lending her impetus as she scrabbled across. The other side was close, solid footing coalescing out of the darkness, and she was almost there, just a few more steps--

Scarlet eyes lit up the darkness, their bloody light glinting off of ebony plating and razored fangs. “You.”

“Holy fuck!” Maggie screeched, leaping backwards. She scrambled back, trying to get away from the--what was that? It was huge, much bigger than any of the vermin-bots she’d seen skittering around in the dark. The bladed shadow moved forward, with the sibilant scrape of metal on metal, and her heart leaped in her chest. “Stay away from me, you fucking--” Another scramble backwards along the tangle of wiring… but this time her foot encountered nothing but air. She lurched sideways, grasping for a handhold, her other hand slipped …

… and she fell.

Maggie screamed, a high terrified shriek, limbs whacking painfully against metal as she tumbled, expecting at any moment to feel her bones snap against the impact of the ground. Instead she slammed into something that gave way, something that flailed and fell *under* her with an outraged squawk of its own.

They hit the floor hard, with a teeth-rattling clang that snapped her head back and blasted the air from her lungs, cracking both knees and an elbow against unyielding metal.

“Oh, God ...” Everything hurt. Maggie drew a deep breath, surprised to be able to do so. Ribs, check. Toes, ankles, hands, check. Going to have whiplash, though, and a fuckload of bruises and scrapes. Her food cube was squashed, which wasn’t going to do it any favors in taste. Her makeshift tools were scattered everywhere. But she was alive. All told, it wasn’t that much damage, given how far she’d fallen. Maybe that was because she’d landed on the … the … a bird-dragon? She blinked dazedly at a narrow beaked face, armored in scuffed yellow and black plating.

“Primus. You gotta be yanking my drivechain,” said the bird.

Maggie yelped breathlessly and rolled off, hands scrabbling across the floor. She came up with the twisted bit of metal she’d been using as a screwdriver, and brandished it at the shadowy bird. “Stay back!” she warned, the metal point trembling as her hand shook.

The bird’s crimson, glowing eyes narrowed. “Me stay back? *Me* stay back?!” It uttered a squawking, chittering sound, then switched back to English. At least, Maggie was pretty sure the robot-animal-thing was speaking English, though what it was saying made no sense. And how had it learned so much of her language?

“You’re the one who fell on me, you know! I was just minding my own business, flying along, and then you decided to come screaming down the pipes like your tail feathers are on fire. And do I even get thanks for denting up my poor wings in order to catch you? Of course not!” The thing clacked its beak in disgust. “How much do you weigh, anyway? I thought organics were supposed to be tiny. I was in better shape that last time I was trampled by a nosoron--”

Maggie gaped. Despite having broken both their falls, the robot bird didn’t seem particularly injured as it righted itself on skinny, raptor-like legs, fanning one steel-feathered wing forward for inspection, then the other. It was swan-necked, with a reptilian head that ended in a pointed, beaklike mouth, and a long, dorsal-spined tail that lashed in aggravation. Most of it was armored in scuffed plates about the size of her hand, or by sharp rib-like struts, but she could see little gears and wires underneath. All told, it was about as big as she was, though with a good ten-foot wingspan.

She got the feeling that it was trying to distract her. Still, all her dazed brain could come up with was-- “... did you just call me fat?”

A second later, she felt a breath of heat across her bare shoulder blades.

Dog’s balls. Maggie lunged forward, only to have one knee give way underneath her, turning her attack into more of a really good flop than a body press. Still, she managed to crash into the indignantly squawking bird-thing, grappling with its thin neck and surprisingly flexible body. It moved like a snake beneath her, or a ferret, twisting and so lithe it seemed to have no bones at all. Wrapping one arm around that twisting neck, she pressed her little screwdriver to the underside of its jaw. “Stay where you are, or the bird gets it,” she snarled, teeth bared.

A long shadow detached itself from the tangle of draped cabling… and a black mechanical panther landed lightly on the floor, silent like nothing else she’d ever encountered on this clanking mechanical world, barely even disturbing the dust as it moved.

Not exactly a panther, Maggie realized dimly as the thing’s murderously crimson eyes lit once more, casting bloody shadows over the rusted and weathered metal sheeting. It was huge; its back would probably be level with the center of her chest, if she stood. Its legs were too long, disturbingly jointed. And, from what little she could tell in the flickering, shifting light… it looked like it had been made of swords, every angle a bladed edge.

The panther’s hellfire eyes flicked to the bird, as the big cat-thing paced a slow, tight circle around them both. It made a complicated series of sounds, a little like an old-style modem--if a modem had ever gotten into a fight with a blender during dial-up, anyway.

The bird replied, a rising syncopated chittering that almost sounded--indignant? Maggie panted, sure she was hearing things. She tightened her grip, and the bird-thing settled down, twisting slightly to regard her out of one skeptical optic. “Seriously? I save your squishy little frame and this is the thanks I get?”

“I wouldn’t have needed saving if it hadn’t been for *him*,” Maggie snarled, trying to watch both the metal panther and keep an eye on her prisoner at the same time. “I didn’t ask to be here, you know. So just back off, or--”

“Or what? You’re gonna stab me with that little bit of metal?” The bird thing didn’t seem overly concerned about that possibility. “Look, even if you manage to do some damage, all you’re gonna do is make the boss angry. Which is gonna make Ravage even more pissy, and Flipsides’ll get all upset, and then the others will blame me for it even though it wasn’t even my fault, and you STILL won’t get what you want, you know that, right?”

“I don’t give a flying fuck what your ‘boss’ wants,” Maggie retorted. “I’m not a pet, and I’m not a chew toy!”

“Well, duh.” The bird-thing huffed--a weird clattering vent. “For one thing, pets are a lot cheaper. You think we go spend thousands of perfectly good credits on organics every orn?”

The panther-thing regarded them both. Then it sat … and spoke. “You will not be harmed. Our master wishes to speak with you about how you and the other humans have been treated. Nothing more.” The catlike creature’s voice was dark, a smooth metallic baritone, its English accentless and perfect.

"Ha, sure," Maggie snorted. "And that's why I've gotta be carted around in a cage, right, so all you blokes can gawk and work out who - or what - fucks me first, huh? " She tightened her grip on the bird. "Tell me another one."

"None of us are - Primus, you keep doing that and you're going to get cut, and I don't want even more your organic fluids all over my cervical struts; do you even realize how hard it is to-"

"The cube is for your own well being," said the panther as the dragon-bird-thing continued grumbling about organic fluids contaminating his plating. "Organics are... ill-suited to the environmental hazards on Cybertron. For instance, a few moments ago you were trying to climb into an air exchange manifold--one that regularly becomes hot enough to broil your internals."

Maggie couldn't help glancing up, to the darkened opening she'd been trying to reach. Was it getting warmer in here? "Least I would have died free," came out of her mouth, before her brain could override it. Dying was most definitely not on her 'to do' list. But then, neither was playing mouse for an enormous clockwork panther, so ....

The cat exchanged a significant look with the bird, though Maggie wasn't sure about what. The spiked, clublike tip of the panther's tail tapped contemplatively.

"We will not require you to return to the cage, then." The huge cat glanced up, even the twist of its shoulder and corded neck bespeaking a lazy kind of strength. "I propose that we discuss the terms of your stay with us somewhere more comfortable. We will bargain fairly. Indeed, to ensure that we do, you may continue to hold Buzzsaw hostage."

"Whaaat!?"

“Buzzsaw, huh?” An oddly appropriate name, given the thing’s abrasive personality. Maggie considered the offer. It wasn’t much of one, when you got right down to it, but it was still more of a concession than any of the bigger aliens had ever bothered with. She was also all too aware that their current stalemate couldn’t last forever, and she knew from harsh experience that she would tire out long before either of the aliens did. Better to negotiate while she could still think straight. “Fine. Let’s ‘discuss’ things. Where are we going?”

“Follow me,” the panther said, rising to its feet once more.

 

*********

 

The trip was a slow one, hampered as it was by Maggie's limp as much as her grip on the bird-dragon thing. Who evidently did *not* like walking, and wasn’t shy about expressing his displeasure about the whole situation. In detail.

“Seriously, this is so slagging stupid. I don’t just have wings for decoration, ya know? Why the frag we have to walk, just because some organic says so … Can’t you go any faster? Don't sling that bit of mesh over me - do I look like a courier drone? Oh frag me, what the - and we're only to the first wall junction! At this rate, it’ll be a vorn before get anywhere, and I’m pretty sure your species doesn’t live that long.” The bird-thing twisted its neck, giving her a sour look.

“Deal with it. Because if you think I’m going to let go of the first tiny bit of leverage I’ve managed to get my hands on since I got here, you’ve got another thing coming,” Maggie retorted, never pausing in her slow, awkward walk, one arm firmly hooked around the thing’s neck and the point of her tool hovering threateningly over one scarlet eye. Her makeshift sack of squashed food cube and tools, hooked over the bird's spines, slapped its side with every hopping step.

“Leverage? Hah! Like I--” the bird-thing--Buzzsaw--abruptly shut up. Ahead of them, the panther never looked back, but that heavy, bladed mace of a tail lashed twice in silent warning. Or maybe it was aggravation at their slow progress--who could tell?

“We’re almost there,” the cat said, as they climbed out from behind a loosened ventilation grille. “This room will do.” The giant door directly ahead--sized for regular mecha, it was far larger than any of them needed--irised open in response to some silent command. The panther padded inside without looking backwards, as if utterly unconcerned about whether Maggie would follow. And why would it be, really? It’s not like she had anywhere else to go.

She followed slowly, tightening her grip on Buzzsaw. She wasn’t sure what she was expecting; perhaps a lavish cathedral-sized salon, full of alien decorations and trophies--and cages--like in the Tower. Or maybe a bare room, a giant sized version of her cube-prison, empty of anything she might be able to use as a weapon or tool.

This room, however, was neither. If anything, it reminded her a bit of her workshop back on Earth, for all that it was significantly cleaner.

Half the furnishings--the table, the shelves along the walls, a weird pedestal-chair-thing--were enormous, and obviously intended for full sized mecha. The rest of the room, though, was scaled down to human size. Or--she glanced over at the panther again--mini-mech size, rather. There were consoles, some of the flexible computer-tablet things she’d seen the big mecha use, several tables and open storage cubes and any number of tools, bits of wiring, and other, less-identifiable objects scattered around. A few of them were obviously half-finished projects of some kind, and some things looked like weapons, while others were--toys, maybe? Some of them looked a bit like things she’d seen in the Tower, and her fingers itched to take them apart.

She ruthlessly suppressed the urge to go investigate and figure out what they could do. “Focus, Maggie,” she muttered. She couldn’t afford to lose the upper hand now, no matter how how tired, bruised, and hungry she was. Or how shiny the tech.

“There is a lift over here that will take you up to the work-surfaces,” the panther said, indicated a metal platform inset into a nearby wall. “That will give you access to more potential exits and defensible spaces. Unless you wish to remain on the floor?” Its tone was neutral, as if it didn’t care one way or another.

"How is it that you blokes speak English, but the big ones only know a few words?" Maggie demanded. Maybe size and intelligence were inversely correlated. Maggie regarded the panther suspiciously. Not for the first time, she wondered if this was some kind of a crazed fever dream, full of oddly-solicitous talking animals. This entire escapade had been a trip down the rabbit hole, in more ways than one.

"Ha!" Buzzsaw snorted. "No surprise there. Betchya your owners just couldn't be troubled to upload your langua- erk!"

"Like hell they owned me. You watch your words," Maggie hissed, yanking Buzzsaw's head around. A coil of wire, balanced on the edge of the table some two meters overhead, caught her eye. Maybe she could use it to tie the bird up, somehow? The lift was big enough for both her and her hostage, and she'd be able to get a better view of the lay of the land from up there, too. Or the room, rather. "Come on. We're going up. And no funny business," she growled at Buzzsaw.

"You know I could just fly- ugh!" The bird shot her a dirty look as she tugged. "Fine. Look, I'm moving. There, happy?" Heaving a rattling and much-put-upon sigh, the bird hopped up onto the platform when prodded. Maggie couldn't see him push any buttons, but a moment after she stepped on, the lift began to smoothly rise.

The top of the workspace was probably four meters off the ground. Almost as wide as a two-lane road, it stretched the length of one wall. More parts and projects littered the subtly-padded surface, these ones bigger, like fancy sculptures. Twisted courses of wiring chased the planes and joints of plates larger than her whole body. A coiled section of segmented tubing as thick as her leg ended in a... a cross between a grappling hook made of knives, and a sculpted flower - a metal magnolia the size of her two cupped hands.

And there were tools. Tools the like of which she hadn't seen in years, and some for which she couldn't even guess at their purpose; large and small, sleek and sculpted, some in boxes or arrayed on racks beside still more parts. Some were the kinds of cleaning tools that were all she'd been allowed to use for ages, but there was a lot more than just those. There were parts of every description, too - a dozen sets of optical lenses, all different sizes, gleamed blankly at her as she tugged Buzzsaw, grumbling, off the lift. She might not even have noticed if the bird had tried to escape - not with so many intricate... things arrayed around her, all of them just begging to be explored.

She managed only a step towards the beckoning tools, though, when the panther made a standing jump onto the table, as graceful as if a sixteen-foot vertical leap was nothing to it. The cat stretched himself out, reclining regally. It seemed even larger in the direct light, the metal of its frame a glossy, unrelieved black, devoid of any color, like the void of space. "You mentioned demands," prompted the panther, though she hadn't.

But it was a place to start, anyway. "I... Yeah. For starters, I want some clothes," Maggie blurted.

The big cat tilted its bladed head. "You desire... cloth coverings?" it hazarded, as if uncertain.

"Like a sack or something?" Buzzsaw clacked his beak. “Armor maybe? You could definitely use some. Not that it would make you any less squishy.” He eyed her critically from one scarlet optic, cocking his head.

“Not a sack,” Maggie said firmly, scowling at her erstwhile prisoner. “Clothes. Fabric coverings, to keep me warm and protect my skin.” Not to mention her modesty, but she’d learned early on that the big aliens simply didn’t understand that particular concept. And why would they? Did they even have private parts under all that armor? Their plugs didn’t seem to count, that was for sure.

“Sounds like armor to me,” Buzzsaw grumbled.

“Such things should not be difficult to fabricate,” the panther said, unperturbed. “I am sure we can pull patterns from the informational datasets on humans. What else?”

“I--” Maggie hesitated, caught off-guard by the panther-thing’s easy agreement. “I want food. And water. Clean, unadulterated sources that I can access whenever I want. And I want to be able to come and go as I like.”

The panther’s scarlet optics flickered. In the big mecha, that often was a sign of surprise--the Cybertronian equivalent of a blink, or a double-take--but it was next to impossible to read the catlike mech’s alien faceplates. “You have not been provided sufficient nourishment?”

Maggie snorted. "Sufficient? Hardly. And even if I had, 'sufficient' isn't the same thing as 'whenever I want’. Not to mention I've been eating the same damn thing ever since I got here. There’s gotta be something else edible on this damn planet."

"Hn." The tip of the big cat's tail flicked. "Patchjob is both a chemist and the best engineer among us. Are you willing to work with him to identify the fuels that best match your needs?"

Maggie hesitated. "Patchjob - he’s the big guy?"

Buzzsaw whistled a descending trill. "Nope! Try again!"

The cat shot the other mechanism a glare. "He is a symbiont, like us. About half my size. Ah- he has already produced a sample of the clothing you desire. May he bring it in?"

“Already? How did--” Remembering how easily the big aliens produced items out of seemingly thin air--and oh, how she wanted to get a look at the mechanisms and software behind that kind of dimensional manipulation!--Maggie thought better of the question. She levelled a suspicious glare at both of the beast-mecha instead. “Calling for reinforcements, are we?”

“If I wanted reinforcements, Patchjob would not be the individual I would summon,” the panther-thing said, unperturbed. “If I call him in, you will see why.”

Maggie dithered for a moment, then gave in. “Fine. But no funny business!” Buzzsaw gave a metallic chortling sound, oddly like a human chuckle. “What’s so funny? And what the hell is a ‘symbiont’, anyway?” Might as well get some explanations as long as she was here. Knowledge being power and all that rot.

“Symbionts … are mecha created to bond with carriers. Each symbiont chooses a carrier, who then serves as guardian and guide. In turn, we choose to obey our Master, weld ourselves to his purposes, and share our knowledge whenever he commands,” the panther said.

“You mean …. you’re actually made to be slaves?” Maggie said, appalled. “That’s horrible!”

“What?? No!” Buzzsaw hopped awkwardly in her grip, that long, flexible neck turning until the bird-thing could glare at her properly. “Just because we need carriers doesn’t mean we’re slaves. Carriers are *made* for us, just like we’re made for them.” The bird-thing rattled its wings indignantly. “Slaves … honestly!”

“Carriers and symbionts are interdependent by design,” the panther put in more calmly. “The relationship is symbiotic, not parasitic."

"We can leave any time, if we wanted," said a new voice softly, and Maggie nearly wrenched her neck, she looked up so fast. There seemed to be a new hole in the wall, or... no, rather a door, only about waist high. It opened onto a pipe that ran the length of one wall, about head-high to her on the table. A new robot-creature hesitated at the new entrance, yellow-banded plating gleaming in the lights.

This one looked like a lightly built goanna, a monitor lizard with thin, clever-looking, clawed hands and a low-slung reptilian gait. The glossy overlapping plates--scales?--of its back looked like they’d be about thigh-high on her, and it was not quite as long as the panther. It also clutched... something that looked like a white lab coat from an old movie. And also a weird, small hat - some kind of a oddly-spotted french beret? "But so long as we stay, we give Soundwave our loyalty and knowledge. In return, we know he'd do anything to keep us safe and happy. Uhm." The lizard skittered a few steps closer, glittering aquamarine frills flaring a bit on the crest of its head, matching its four vivid turquoise eyes. "…what are you doing to Buzzsaw?" it asked, so soft and forlorn-sounding that Maggie felt almost guilty for holding the wretched bird hostage.

"Watch this," whispered Buzzsaw with a conspiratorial wink. He issued a deeply disturbing, grating noise. "Help! Run, Patchy! Organic's gone mad!"

The monitor lizard - Patchjob - jerked back with a frightened 'eep!', flinging the hat and coat to flutter away. He stumbled backwards over his own tail, clutching at it with skinny forearms. There was a sudden whoosh of indrawn air, the plates of his sides expanding rapidly--and all at once inflated, doubling his size like a pufferfish with a windy-sounding *thwoom*.

Patchjob had evidently forgotten, however, that he'd been standing on a pipe. Spikes wriggling, the yellow and teal lizard-ball rocked first one way, then the other... then fell, landing on the tabletop. It bounced several times, with a breathy little squeak at each impact, before rocking to a halt.

“Oh shit--are you okay?” Maggie asked before she could stop herself. The ball didn’t answer, and she cuffed a cackling Buzzsaw over the beak with her free hand. “That was mean! What did that poor thing ever do to you?”

“Are you kidding? That was hilarious! Comedy gold! Patchy’s always fun to surprise. Whoomp!” Buzzsaw did his best imitation of the lizard-creature’s reaction, flaring out his plating and mantling his wings in an attempt to look spherical.

“It’s not funny,” Maggie scolded, though okay, it really kind of was. Still, the poor thing had looked terrified. “I’m not going to hurt you,” she told the spiky ball. The last few years had been rough, yeah, and sometimes more than rough, but a person would have to be a monster to attack a critter like this. “Not if you don’t hurt me. Buzzsaw’s just being an ass. Please come out?”

The ball rocked a little, as if uncertain. The panther-thing chuffed impatiently. “Patchjob. Does Buzzsaw actually look injured?”

The Patchjob-ball uncurled slightly, one bright turquoise optic studying all of them from the shadowed interior. “Just a joke?”

“Yes. Just another joke,” the panther said. “And a poor one at that.”

“And I really do want to see the clothes you made,” Maggie added, trying to help.

“You do?” Patchjob uncurled the rest of the way, parts and plating shifting, slotting back into his normal, sleekly-plated form, tail and skinny arms extending. Gathering up his discarded creations, he rose to his … feet? Hindpaws? Maggie wasn’t sure what you called those clawed metal appendages, but they were obviously were a lot more flexible than an actual lizard’s.

Patchjob certainly didn’t seem to have too many problems staying upright. His tail acting as a counterbalance, he padded a step closer, clutching the bundle of fabric to his chest defensively. On his hind legs, he looked remarkably humanoid, like some kind of willowy, slightly-potbellied lizard person. He was maybe a few centimeters shorter than Maggie, with a goanna's long body and bullish neck, but short little legs. “Well, then! I uh--I brought a tunic." It nervously smoothed out the lab coat, holding the garment upside down, as if it expected Maggie to cram her legs through the sleeves. "And a hat!”

“A hat?” Buzzsaw said quizzically. “What the frag is a--it’s a helm covering? Why does he need a helm covering? That’s the only part of him that even *has* a decent covering to begin with.”

“Hats are very important for organic thermoregulation,” Patchjob said indignantly. “And I even figured out how to add spots for camouflage."

"Camouflage?" Buzzsaw fixed the lizard with a glare. "Do you even know what I had to go through to find him the first time? And now you want to make him even harder to spot?!" Buzzsaw clacked his beak.

"Who?" Maggie demanded. Maybe the head trauma was worse than she'd thought.

"Everyone feels better with camouflage. Here!” Patchjob thrust the beret at her. The … leopard-print beret. Assuming leopards came in neon green.

“Er, thanks?” Maggie took the bit of shaped cloth, inspecting it warily. She’d spent enough time around the mechs on Earth to be wary of the aliens’ attempts to replicate organic substances. It’s not that they wouldn’t get it right … eventually. But the first few tries could be pretty far off the mark. And the mechs on this planet hadn't seemed to care about human needs at all. Still, it felt like cloth. Looked and smelled like cloth. And, when she gingerly plopped it on her head, it didn’t transform and try to eat her face. That was a plus.

"Oh, you're so much harder to see now!" Patchjob said happily, cocking his head in shy admiration. He offered the upside-down coat. "I programmed this one first, you see, so I wasn't sure how to put a pattern on it. But if you want I could make another one maybe with at least some stripes--"

"Uh. No, this is fine," Maggie said, reaching out with the hand not wrapped around Buzzsaw's neck. She hesitated for an instant - what if this was some kind of plan to tangle up her screwdriver, to disarm her? But nobody made any sudden moves; the lizard just handed over the coat and then sat back on his tail, clawed hands folded over his belly like a kangaroo. Buzzsaw blinked up at her.

Maggie drew a steadying breath, then slowly let go of her hostage, ready to make a grab for the bird at the least sign of trouble. She shrugged the coat over her shoulders and maneuvered one arm and then the other through the sleeves, wincing as her bruises protested. It felt... just strange, having cloth against her skin after so long. Even buttoned, the labcoat wasn't much warmer than going nude, and it was about two sizes too large, but it did have wonderful, deep pockets.

"That looks like terrible armor," said Buzzsaw flatly.

"It’s not meant to be! Besides, it looks very nice," said Patchjob, cocking his head the other way. "Though maybe we could cut some holes, to show off your own colors?"

Maggie paused, then slipped a few of the tools from the sack on Buzzsaw into her pockets. "Er, no. No more holes--this is fine. And what col--?” Following the direction of Patchjob’s gaze down to her bruise-splotched thighs, she realized what he was talking about. “Oh. Umm … those aren't decorations. They're just bruises."

Patchjob gaped. "You turn colors when injured? Wait, 'bruises'? You're *leaking* on the *inside*?" Each sentence rose in pitch. He squeal-clicked something, and Buzzsaw answered in a series of modem beeps. The lizard turned back to her, hugging his own tail. Maggie hoped he wasn't about to undergo another panic attack. "How many colors should you be?" Patchjob whispered in horror.

The conversation just kept getting weirder. "Uh. Just one, pretty much." Not like she had any tan lines anymore. She cast about for something to distract Patchjob. "So can you show me how you do this... matter materialization thing? And maybe how to use some of this other-" she gestured at the tools and parts around them. "-stuff?"

More squeeing and rapid-fire clicking followed. "We need to call Flipsides," said Patchjob, not looking distracted at all. "I'll show you anything you want, just please, please don't extinguish, ok?"

“Extinguish? What?” Somewhere along the line, Maggie had apparently lost all control over the situation. She wondered exactly when that had been. Maybe it was when she started having arguments with talking mechanical animals. “Listen, uh--Patchjob? I’m fine. A few bruises are not going to kill me. There’s nothing on fire that needs to be ‘extinguished’, really.” That had sounded better in her head, for some reason. But when in Rome …. She wrapped the coat tighter around herself. “This is already making me feel better,” she added. “Thank you.” Oddly enough, it was the truth--not that it was all that warm, but the feel of cloth against her skin was comforting.

“But you’re hurt!” Patchjob turned an accusing look on the panther. “Soundwave isn’t going to like it.”

“He did it to himself,” the panther said, apparently immune to the lizard-robot’s wide blue eyes--all four of them. “Fell off a pipe he was climbing on.”

“Only because you startled me!” Maggie said indignantly. “And who are you calling ‘he’?” She might be skinnier than she used to be, but there was no way she could be mistaken for a guy. Just to be sure, she glanced downward. Yep. Boobs still present and accounted for.

Buzzsaw looked up from a jaw-cracking yawn. "What's on fire?" he asked, bewildered but interested.

"Would you rather have a function-pronoun? I went looking for one, but I could only find three so I picked the default but if you have one you like better-" Patchjob started, the words tumbling over one another.

"Nothing's on *fire*," Maggie growled, trying to track the conversation. "Also, I'm female, so yeah, I'd appreciate - wait, what now?" Multiple sets of mechanical eyes flickered at her, Patchjob's mouth frozen half open in an expression that looked a whole lot like shock.

"Female," said the panther flatly.

"A creator-human? Seriously? Like I'm gonna fall for that." Scoffed Buzzsaw.

"-'m calling Flipsides," Patchjob squeaked, breathless.

"Ok now wait a minute," Maggie interrupted, grabbing Buzzsaw around the neck once more. "No calling anyone else. Got that? And also, what the hell?" Clearly, she should have strangled the bird-dragon earlier, because either it was blind or weird or insane or - or something. How could you just... not believe that someone was a girl? Boobs and lack of a dick weren't clues?

"Uh, well--" said Patchjob, hugging his tail.

"Yeah, you heard me." Buzzsaw’s beakish faceplates had shifted into familiar belligerent lines. "The species file says alla your creators leak fuel. And you're not leaking any fuel." He paused. "Except for those patches under your skin," he amended.

"So he's a female! Err, she," squeaked Patchjob.

"Not because of the bruises-" started Maggie, trying to simultaneously wrangle Buzzsaw and figure out what the hell was going on.

'Pbfft! I knew it!" crowed the bird.

"Because of my whole - Christ. I don't even know how to - I don't have a cock, alright?"

Buzzsaw's red eyes pinned down into pinpoints as he processed that. "Why would you need a chicken?"

"What? No!"

"She means that she has the secondary physical traits of a female, and not those of a male of her species," came a new voice from the open side of the mech-sized door. "Uhm, am I getting that right?"

“That’s right. Boobs and no donger equals fema--” Maggie snapped, turning her head--then froze in fear, clutching her hostage convulsively. “Fuck!” In a flash her improvised weapon was back and pointing at one scarlet eye, even as she instinctively tried to retreat. Buzzsaw was heavier than he looked, though, despite his elongated frame--trying to drag him backwards was like trying to drag an anvil. “Don’t you come any nearer! If you do, I’ll--” Truth be told, she wasn’t sure what she would do. But she wasn’t going back into that cage again!

In the doorway, the small, magenta-and-white robot, the most human-looking she’d seen so far--meeped in dismay, clutching at its perch. Because unlike all the others, this miniature alien hadn’t come on its own two--or four--feet.

This one had brought their ‘boss’.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beta by femme4jack!
> 
> \---

Her new ‘owner’ tilted its -- his? -- head slightly. The robot wasn’t as big as some of the other aliens she’d seen, though it was definitely a size class up from most of the mecha in the Tower. If it lacked anything in size, though, it made up for that in intimidation. Instead of the smooth, curved plates of the Tower-bots, this alien was all angles and pointy bits framing a boxy chest. Broad, daggered panels swept downward from its back, and the place where its eyes should be was covered by a reflective visor, a darksome mirror that absorbed the room -- took it in, and warped it, casting back a dim and distorted vision.

Slowly, the full-size mech lifted one jaggedly-armored hand. Even the fingertips had been shaped into short, wicked-looking claws, each the size of Maggie’s whole hand. But the little humanlike symbiont didn't seem to care, scrambling without hesitation from his shoulder-perch and onto the platform of that dangerous palm.

"I'm really sorry to scare you. I didn't mean to, I promise," called the little mech as the big one - his carrier, apparently - lowered him gently to the ground. 'Little', of course, was relative: the symbiont was probably a couple centimeters taller than Maggie and far more stoutly built. "My name is Flipsides. Err, that's the short version, anyway. I don't think that anyone's asked you your designation yet-"

"It’s Maggie. And you can just fucking stay where you are. I’m not going back into that cage," Maggie snarled, yanking on Buzzsaw's head. Not that she got very far. It reminded her of the times she'd tried to drag the family mule where the beast didn't want to go. "Or else-"

The tension proved too much for Patchjob. The goanna-mech inflated with a *thwoom*, transforming again into an oversized, spiky beach ball, short spines wriggling a bit as if looking for something to cling to on the smooth tabletop.

"Oh dear." Flipsides sighed, ignoring Buzzsaw’s cackling chortles. “Soundwave will stay right here, don't worry. I promise, we're not going to hurt you, Maggie, alright? And we're not going to make you go back to the cube," he added, as the panther chuffed a few short tones. He held up white hands in a gesture of peace. "I'm a... a nurse, sort of, or a doctor, and I'd just like to make sure that you are all right. That's all. I don't have any weapons, I promise."

Maggie scowled at him suspiciously. The little magenta and white mech looked friendly--but then, so had the alien ‘recruiters’ that had gotten her into this mess in the first place. “Like you need them,” she shot back. “Just because you’re a runt doesn’t mean you don’t still have the advantage when it comes to muscle.” She’d learned the hard way about the aliens’ inhuman strength. “‘Sides, what does a robot doctor know about humans anyway?”

“Oh, you’d be surprised,” Flipsides said, apparently oblivious to being insulted. “The Tower survey packets were quite thorough, and they weren’t hard to get, once we knew where to look. Human biology is actually very interesting, especially when you get into the evolutionary aspects. You have no armor, no ability to reconfigure your frames … you’ve even shed almost all your natural weaponry, all in favor of extreme adaptability. And it worked! On almost any other world, such a single-threaded tactic would have likely led to your extinction. Instead humans are now the dominant lifeform on your world.” The little mech stepped closer, blue optics glowing with enthusiasm. “Do you even realize how extraordinary that is? How many things had to happen in exactly the right order to allow you to even exist?”

Maggie snorted. “You think *I’m* unlikely? Have you taken a look at yourself lately?” Her hands were shaking, she realized quite suddenly. Low blood sugar, maybe, or just exhaustion and injuries. She drew a deep breath. _Steady there, Maggie girl -- think, think._ Escape was no longer in the cards--she’d lost that option the moment she’d fallen from the wire. And she couldn’t hold Buzzsaw hostage forever. Still, there had to be something she could salvage from this mess.

Flipsides’s eyes flickered in an alien blink of surprise. “I guess I hadn’t thought about it. We’re probably the first mechanical race that yours has ever met, right? We must look really strange to you,” he admitted easily. The little mech had made his way nearly to the lift. Flipsides pressed a knuckle to its--his?-- mouth-opening. The gesture looked thoughtful. “You know, since you’re not going to be in a cube anymore, we should install some manual controls for the doors and lifts and everything. Maybe a… a toggle, or something?” He looked up at her. “If we put a switch here, could you use it?”

Oblivious to his hostage status, Buzzsaw called down. “Yup, probably. He -- she -- has opposable jointed digits and everything.”

Flipsides lifted his plating in a miniature-sized version of a mech’s smile. “How many joints?”

“Three on most, two on the opposable one. But it’s really mobile. Something to do with the wrist, maybe? Hey, you’re smart enough to use a switch, right?” That last was apparently directed toward Maggie.

Maggie could not recall a time in her entire life when her thumbs had been a topic of interested discussion. This whole encounter was beyond surreal. On the other hand, they weren’t talking about her non-leaking boobs anymore. That was something. “Are you fucking kidding--?” The bird tilted his head, looking distinctly confused at the idiom, and Maggie groaned. “Yes, I can figure out how to flip a switch. Look, they might not have been up to your standards, but I was building and programming robots of my own when I was eight, alright?”

“Drones? Really?” Patchjob’s spikes wriggled around, a turquoise optic peering out from the shadows of the ball.

“Really really,” Maggie snapped, her temper breaking through the remaining threads of her patience. “I know you fuckers don’t think of us as anything but sex toys, but I do have brains. I can think, I can build shit, useful shit, and if I’d wanted to be treated like a piece of ass, I would have stayed on rootin’ Earth!”

Patchjob ‘eeped’ a bit from inside his ball, but uncurled a little more. Buzzsaw was giving her the side-eye--literally, head tilted birdlike, one red optic regarding her closely-while Flipsides looked uncertainly back at his master, then up at her.

“... you build with organic excrement?” Buzzsaw finally said. “Ew.”

“What? No!” Fed up and feeling more than a little ridiculous, Maggie finally let go, giving the stupid bird-dragon a shove that sent Buzzsaw swaying backwards. Feeling her knees tremble beneath her, she let herself sink to the tabletop, pushing a shaking hand through her hair. Enough of this shit. Adrenaline could only take you so far, and she was so fucking tired ….

There was a subaudible bit of chittering, and a flurry of *tinks* and other metal-on-metal sounds--and then small hands were gingerly patting her back, talons prickling against her lab coat. “It’s okay,” the goanna said, bright aqua optics wide and bright as it hunkered down next to her and curled its tail around her knees. “We’ll fix it, you’ll see. That’s why you’re here, so you can show us your *real* function.”

A pair of white armored legs trotted into her line of sight, and Flipsides knelt in front of her, reaching out to pat her hand. He patiently waited out her reflexive flinch, then touched the back of her hand lightly, the white metal of his hands surprisingly warm. “Patchjob is right. No one will make you do anything you don’t want. Not here. Soundwave will make sure of that. All of us will. Even Buzzsaw -- he’s very sorry.”

The bird warble-bleeped something that sounded like a protest. That set off the two semi-humanoid mini-mechs, in a confounding chorus of beeps and squeals and alien gestures. Buzzsaw slumped, wings drooping, and heaved a theatrical rattle. Grumbling in his machine language, he clatter-hopped to Maggie’s side and settled down like an emu, folding digitigrade legs until he was resting on the tabletop beside her. “I am very sorry,” he enunciated, sounding not at all as if he meant it, then added in a low mutter, “--that your idioms are so bizarre.”

“Buzzsaw!”

“What? They are!” The bird protested, and the two bipedal mechs broke into more electronic noises. It reminded Maggie of the big family down the street, back in Australia, when she’d been little and rain still came often enough to grow wheat. They’d squabbled almost constantly, but hugged and laughed even more. The big mech still hadn’t moved from the open doorway, just watching. Creepy as fuck, but at least not directly threatening. Maggie scrubbed a hand across her face.

The argument seemed to be winding down. The nearly-human mech, Flipsides, settled back on his bottom, legs bent, trying to mimic the way Maggie sat. He wasn’t quite flexible enough to sit cross-legged, apparently, though he gave it a shot. He reached out and unhooked Maggie’s makeshift rusack from Buzzsaw’s back. The only thing in it now was her food cube, still bearing the imprint of the back of her head, and she tensed, but Flipsides only pressed the sack into her hands. “It’s hard to tell from scans, but your fuel tank seems pretty low. Would you like to -- to eat? And what else could we do, to make you more comfortable here? Ravage has mentioned some of the things you needed, and the others are working on those.” He nodded in the direction of the panther, who currently seemed to be doing his best to ignore all of them.

“Ooh! Maybe Soundwave could paint you? That always makes me feel better,” Patchjob said, perking up. “He’s really good.”

Maggie was hard-pressed to keep her eyebrows from climbing right up her forehead, but she knew a line of bullshit when it was being fed to her. “Tha -- okay, Soundwave. Soundwave is a painter? Right.” Light glinted across the big mech’s visor, the points and daggers of armor, as it shifted its weight a little. The mech seemed almost faceless behind that visor--but she’d seen first-hand how the other aliens treated him. They hadn’t been able to get out of his way fast enough as they had left the auction, kowtowing to the dark mech like he was some kind of assassin, or gang lord--someone who’d kill you as easy as breathing. And this crazy bunch of animal-bots wanted her to believe that a mech who apparently scared other mechs just by *existing* was nothing more than some kind of, what, zookeeper? Pet groomer? Riiiight.

Still, eating something was a good idea. She rummaged around and broke off a piece of the nutritional cube. It was rubbery now, rather than spongy. Great. But at least it gave her something to chew on while she thought, and made punching Buzzsaw a bit less tempting. “You said ‘others’,” Maggie said, avoiding Patchjob’s suggestion. “Just how many of you are there?”

“Oh, Soundwave has a full cohort,” Flipsides said proudly. “He’s ten-framed, and very highly ranked. Most of us have been with him for vorns --Ravage, there, is his First.” He gestured at the panther-mech.

“Ravage, huh? That’s your name?” Maggie asked, more to give herself time to think than anything.

“Correct,” the catlike mech replied, never moving. “We are all Chronicler-class mecha. Our function is to obtain and preserve knowledge.”

“So, what--he just collects you guys, or something?” Maggie said disbelievingly, waving a hand at the bigger mecha. Had she honestly just been bought by the alien equivalent of the crazy cat lady? Crazy cat lady *assassin* painter. Whatever.

“Collects? No. We decide who our master will be. But courts? Yes.” Ravage stretched out his forelimbs, spreading bladed talons in a quintessentially feline gesture. “He has further functions as well -- Soundwave is the Prime’s Archivist, the guardian and gatekeeper to Vector Sigma itself. And he has been tasked with finding out the truth about your kind.”

“The truth? What truth?” Maggie asked suspiciously. “And tasked by whom?”

“The Towers assert that their humans have been treated fairly, in accordance with the Prime’s decree regarding interspecies trade. They additionally claim that humans possess no greater function than as an … interfacing aid.” Ravage glanced over at his carrier. The big mech stirred, and broke his silence for the first time.

“Soundwave: given this task by the Lord Prime.” That voice was dispassionate, oddly modulated, the words mechanical and abrupt. It was deeper than the mechs’ electronic-squealing language, grating like something sharp being dragged over the bumps of her spine. Maggie shivered--this was the first one of the aliens she’d encountered that actually sounded like a machine.

That monstrously metallic voice was a little terrifying, but Maggie had bigger concerns. “Well, I can tell you right now that’s fucking bullshit!” She jabbed a finger at the big cat, then paused. “A very big lie,” she added, before Buzzsaw could comment on her ‘idioms’ again. “I don’t know what kind of law that is, but either it’s bodgy unfair, or these Towers are breaking it. And, fuck, people used to have all kinds of jobs before they got put in those boxes.”

The tip of Ravage’s tail tapped against the table. “The Towers claim that you have enriched habitats--”

“What, a freaking box? Or a couple sheets of this crook shit?” Maggie flapped a corner of the rough metal burlap.

“--and social interaction--”

“With whom? Obnoxious assholes I’d never have spent time with in real life? The only decent one of the bunch got snatched out and carried away, fuck if I know where, and then other ones got dumped in. Fuck, I must have spent a month in the small box alone, without music or anything but my own thoughts or--” She probably should have been more careful. If this weird bunch of robot animals wanted information, then telling everything might spell the end to this pretense at humane treatment. But Maggie was mad as a cut snake now, and the words just wouldn’t seem to stop. “Don’t tell me the big box was any better. ‘Social interaction’?! With a rooting pig who wanted sex all the time? And another bloke who didn’t even speak English?”

“English? That’s not a even a real language, though, right?” Buzzsaw clacked his beak. “No magnetic tones, no radio modulations, hardly any vocabulary, no conative optative tense families, no positional gestures --”

“I’ll show you positional gestures!”

“Not agai-- Awwk! Stop that!” Buzzsaw’s neck curved and coiled in Maggie’s clenching fists. The flexible metallic tubing in the armor gaps crimped just a little under her ragged nails. The big alien--Soundwave--stirred slightly, the sibilant scrape of metal upon metal betraying the tiny movement, and Maggie froze, memories of being grabbed and worse sending a frisson of fear down her spine.

Ravage snorted, a metallic chuffing sound. He laid his head down over his forepaws, a secondary set of scarlet optics spiralling lazily shut. “Silencing Buzzsaw is not quite that easy, I’m afraid. His vocalizer is buried too deeply within his frame.” His slitted scarlet gaze was unreadable, but that rumbling voice was sardonically amused. “If you shift your grip a bit higher, however, you may find your technique more effective.”

Higher, huh? Maggie wasted no time, even as Buzzsaw protested. “Ravage, you traitor! I’m gonna--awrk!” Maggie’s fingers pressed down hard on the cable-bundles she’d found under those neckplates, and the bird-dragon collapsed like his wires had been cut. For a brief, terrifying moment Maggie was afraid she’d killed him, never mind that she’d desperately wanted to only a minute ago. Then Buzzsaw’s tail flailed, wings ringing as they twitched and banged against the metal table. “W-wait, I--erk! Stoppit, that fragging tickle--awk! Slagging conductive organics!” Static charge prickled over her skin, and Maggie paused for just a moment.

“Tickles, huh?” She bared her teeth in a smile more fierce than friendly. Time for a language lesson. “Say ‘Uncle!’”

“What? What the Pit does that-t--awrkk!” Maggie squeezed down again. Buzzsaw thrashed for a bit, tail twisting and flailing. Maggie had to duck an uncoordinated swipe of that thrashing tail, and Flipsides threw himself on top of one flailing wing with a yelp when those bladed metal feathers looked like they were about to take her head off. Finally, Buzzsaw conceded. “Erk--fine! What the--awk! Uncle! Uncle! Whatever the frag an uncle is--uncle!”

Maggie sat back, satisfied. “There, that wasn’t so hard, now was it?” she said as Buzzsaw flailed himself upright. “Keep talking shit about humans or our language, and I’ll show you some more ‘positional gestures’, got it?”

“Got it, I got it.” Buzzsaw shook his exterior plating back into place with a loud clatter, flipping his wings indignantly before resettling them. He eyed her sidelong. “Primus--are all humans so mean?”

“Just the girls,” Maggie lied, giving him a feral grin. “Lucky you.”

Patchjob whistled in a manner that sounded appreciative, stretching out his stubby legs where he sat beside Maggie. “That looked very therapeutic,” he said, wiggling his own little talons in front of his face, as if in consideration.

“Don’t you even think about it!” Buzzsaw spat, the effect ruined by the still-dizzy weaving of his long neck whenever he tried to lift his head too high. “So all your creators are also warframes? That’s crazy! Err,” he leaned back, “In a good way!”

“I don’t know what you mean by ‘creators’,” Maggie said. Patchjob was right, though; strangling Buzzsaw had been surprisingly relaxing. “Like artists? Or did you mean people who have babies? Because I don’t think I can. At least, that’s what they said at the training facility med unit, back on earth. And what’s a warframe?”

Optics flickered all around her. “You-- what?” Buzzsaw gaped. “I thought you said you were female!”

“I am!” Maggie defended. “Something about scarring on the ovaries, though? I didn’t really pay attention. I would’ve been preggers by now, most likely, if I could have kids. What?” She’d been a little disturbed at the time, if she recalled right -- but on balance, she’d been more relieved by the news. What kind of future would any children of hers have, anyway? From the way all the mechanical animals were gawping at her, though, she’d said something weird.

The big mech stirred, head lifting, Maggie’s own reflection sliding across that empty visor. “Query: Towers, responsible for this damage?” The words were atonal, mechanically dispassionate. The smaller aliens, however, reacted a great deal more strongly.

“The Towers--deprived a creator of her function?” Flipsides whispered, electric blue eyes wide and horrified. Maggie found herself being wrapped by a blue-plated tail as Patchjob scooted closer with a distressed squeak, squeezing the length protectively around her. Even Ravage dropped his pretense at napping, head lifting, talons curling inward with the screech of metal on metal.

“What? No! I’m pretty sure that was before--wait. Now wait just a fuckin’ minute,” Maggie sputtered. “Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean my only purpose in life is to make rooting babies, and I don’t care what mouth-breathing bloke tries to tell you otherwise!”

“Wait. So you’re not a creator, then?” Buzzsaw said. “I knew it!”

“What the--I told you, I’m not a creator, I’m a woman, you flying freak!” Maggie made an abortive lunge for the bird-thing, only to be thwarted by Patchjob’s protective embrace. At least it was satisfying to see Buzzsaw duck away with a squeak. “Why the hell do you guys keep obsessing about that anyway?”

“We’re sorry, we didn’t mean to offend you,” Flipsides said, trying to calm her down. “We’re just trying to figure out your function. Otherwise, how can we make sure you’re happy?”

“You guys keep going on and on about a function--I don’t have a function! I’m just Maggie, and my function is whatever the fuck I decide it is,” Maggie snarled back. “And while this may come as a shock, that doesn’t include being a fucktoy or a broodmare!”

“Oh dear,” Flipsides said. Buzzsaw chittered a pattern of electronic noises, and Patchjob added something. Flipsides, though, had his head tilted in that way that mechs had when they were listening to something Maggie couldn’t hear. The plates of Flipsides’s face folded into something like a thoughtful frown. He seemed to be choosing his words with care. “I think we’re using the wrong words? Or not explaining them? For us, a function is like a… uhm. See, if you put Buzzsaw into a different frame, or even changed his memories or programming --”

Buzzsaw muttered a series of grumbly blats.

“--he’d be the same... person. He’d still want to find things out, to take them apart and open them up to figure out the underlying laws, no matter what. That’s his function. He’d become glitched and unhappy if he wasn’t allowed to do those things. And he’s like us, one of the Chronicler class, so he remembers all the things he finds out; that’s his function too. In the broadest sense, he supports his society from within, instead of defending its borders or exploring beyond, so he’s foundation-sparked, and that’s another part of his function.” Flipsides peered at Maggie hopefully, like he wasn’t sure if he’d made his meaning plain.

“So when you say ‘function’, you mean personality, maybe? Or purpose?” Maggie had never seen much need for the kind of new-age shit that’d made it through the World Wars unscathed, but she knew people who put stock in it. And it made the whole function-obsession thing make more sense -- it actually explained a few things about Buzzsaw. Maggie gestured in the direction of the full-size mech. “What about… him, then? What’s his function?”

“Soundwave defends us, just like Ravage told you. He makes sure we have what we need to fulfill our functions. He also… hmm. I’m not sure there’s a good word, but he… figures out how to access, organize, and control the information around him?”

“So he’s a hacker?”

Flipsides made that thoughtful gesture again, knuckle pressed to mouth, and Maggie realized why it looked so familiar: she’d made the same gesture, earlier, just before she’d taken the ‘hat’ from Patchjob. The mimicry was equal parts disturbing and warming, and Maggie wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. “Well, that word has a lot of definitions in the file we have,” Flipsides said. “But … yes, mostly?”

“Huh.” Maggie added ‘hacker’ to crazy cat lady, assassin, and pet groomer. It was a surprisingly useful bit of information. Didn’t exactly make her any more comfortable around the big mech, not after all that’d happened… but it helped her suss out what she might be facing. She was starting to see why the animal-aliens were so insistent on knowing her own function. “What about these creators, since you all seem to think I’m one?” Maggie asked, trying to give herself time to think.

“Oh, creator mecha are maker-sparked --that’s a class that includes medics, artists, mechanics, engineers … pretty much anyone who fixes things, or creates them,” Flipsides said earnestly. “But creators are special, you see, because they don’t just make things--they make new people. New sparks. And if someone tried stop them from doing that--” Flipsides glanced up at his master, his expression shifting into something more melancholy, the outer plates of his frame clamping down tight. “It happened once, a long time ago. It was … a horrible thing to do to anyone, but the newsparks … well. That’s why we were worried.”

“Hunh. Okay.” Maggie leaned back against the solid bulk of Patchjob’s tail. “Isn’t that really limiting though? Just because someone has a certain, uh, frame, they have to do a certain job? What if one of these creators doesn’t want to pop out a bunch of new people?”

Optics flickered again, as if something that Maggie had said was as bewildering as everything the robots had told her. “Pop out? Well I, uhm… oh,” said Flipsides, mechanical eyes widening, looking helplessly between the other symbionts.

“Then they get a new frame, and perform a function that suits ‘em better,” said Buzzsaw, wings hunching in a shrugging motion.

“Becoming a creator requires a lot of specialized equipment, though,” Patchjob supplied. “I hope that a creator would discover he prefers a different function sooner rather than later.”

“It’s pretty rare, but stuff like that does happen sometimes.” Buzzsaw eyed Flipsides sideways. “I totally get that organics can’t change their frames, but -- what? Why are you looking at her like that?”

“I believe,” Ravage said, flexing his claws to clear them of table shavings, “that Flipsides has just accessed the ‘reproduction details’ portion of the humans’ file.”

“Huh? Yeah, evolution over generations, blah blah. Organics are weird, but how bad could --” Buzzsaw’s crimson eyes spiraled wider than Maggie had ever seen them go. His whole body stiffened. “Sweet Primus on a microchip!”

“What?” Patchjob said, startled. “What is it?”

“Humans excrete their young!”

“What?!”

“No, no--they don’t,” Flipsides said hastily. “They have dedicated systems for reproduction. But the mortality rate, and the damage it can cause to the creator-female--it’s awful!” Maggie had to admit, she’d never seen one of the aliens look appalled before--but Flipsides looked horrified, and she felt obligated to reassure him.

“It’s not that bad, usually,” she said soothingly. “Or so I’m told. And you forget a lot of the pain once it’s done, apparently.”

“Joors worth of pain that you can’t shut off, permanent damage to your structural integrity, and trauma-induced memory alterations aren’t that bad? Primus,” Buzzsaw said, appalled, and Flipsides made a distressed noise. “Are you sure your species wasn’t designed by the Quintessons?”

Maggie suddenly found herself encircled by two sets of metal arms, trapped by Patchjob and Flipsides’ overlapping protective embraces. “The Quin-whats?” she said, a little muffled. Squirming a bit, she got a hand free, and--after a brief hesitation--gingerly patted Flipsides on the back. Apparently hugs were a universal kind of body language, no mimicry required. Who knew? “Hey--it’s okay. Really. People have been having babies for a long time, and most of them seem to think it’s worth it. Besides, it’s not something we need to worry about with me--and that’s okay too.” She gave him a little smile as Flipsides shifted back to look at her doubtfully. “This way I get to choose my function, see?”

“Everybody should get to choose their function,” whispered Patchjob, squeezing just a little tighter, with great care, like Maggie was as fragile as spun glass -- and she was struck by the thought that maybe choice meant something a little different to the robots. Maybe for them, it was something inborn, there from the beginning. It didn’t necessarily mean free will, or personal agency. But in the end, did it really matter?

It was a chance at a kind of freedom, no matter which way you cut it. Maggie swallowed, cleared her throat. “Okay, now that’s settled,” she said after a moment, fingers already itching for the tools around her. “How about you show me how to install those switches on the lifts? And then I really need a better shower.”

It looked like she was going to be here for a while, after all. And if she was going to be the newest addition to this bizarre little zoo, she might as well start arranging her surroundings to her liking.


	3. Chapter 3

Maggie squinted. “I cannot believe you crammed yourself in here.”

Barely visible behind layers and layers of equipment, a tiny little red optic twisted around to give her a baleful glare. Maggie heaved a sigh and wriggled a bit deeper, pushing her way past drapes of cabling and miscellaneous pointy things. Oh look, there was the console circuit board she’d been trying to find for the past three days. It made sense, actually -- there’d be good airflow here, so there’d be no need for fans or those huge heatsinks she could barely lift. Still, there were times she thought that Soundwave didn’t actually realize he could just call someone up and get the proper hardware delivered. Making do with what you had was a fine and laudable sentiment, but sometimes it made for a goddamn pain in the ass. Like now.

“You go away!” Something clattered.

“I swear to God, Ratbat, if you end up breaking that equipment, you are going to help me weld every last bolt back into place!”

“I’m not going to break it. I know what I’m doing!” Another clatter, and an indignant rattling huff. “And I don’t need your help!”

“Good, ‘cause I’m not going to do anything but kick your little butt when I find you,” Maggie said grimly, clambering awkwardly over another tangle of glowing cables.

“Hah!” It’s amazing how disdainful that squeaky voice could be. “You wouldn’t dare. Soundwave wouldn’t like it. And you wouldn’t like *that*.”

“This may come as a shock to you,” Maggie retorted, “But I really don’t give a damn what Soundwave likes or doesn’t like. Besides, Ravage is the one who sent me crawling in here after you, and I’m pretty sure Soundwave listens to *him*.”

“I don’t care! This is my job, and I’m doing it just fine,” was the petulant reply. “I don’t need help from any muddy little organic!”

Maggie paused in mid-reach, instinctively bristling. Ratbat was a brat, she knew that. And it wasn’t like she hadn’t been referred to as ‘the organic’ during her time in the Towers. But it still made her angry. Still reminded her of everything she’d ever heard back on Earth. Replace ‘organic’ with ‘girl’. Or ‘sheila’, or ‘bitch’.

Just an organic.

Just a girl.

Maggie snarled under her breath. “Well, you’re gonna get my help whether you like it or not,” she called back, wiggling her way through the last gap, into a tiny open space next to where Ratbat had wedged himself. Beady scarlet optics, pinned down in irritation, glowed in the dim space as Ratbat bared his small fangs.

“Go away!”

“Doing just fine, huh?” Maggie studied the bat-stuffed gap. Try as she might, she couldn’t for the life of her determine how the rotten little thing had crammed himself into his current position. Strings of new cabling linked two big platters of electronics to either side, leaving a space just wide enough for a very small mech. But how had he gotten in past all these links and crosswiring? Was there another way in from the other side? “Ravage said that whatever you were doing should have only taken a ream. Care to explain why you’ve been in here for the past, oh, *entire day?*”

“Breem,” Ratbat sniffed haughtily. “And it’s none of your nosey business. So go make wax someplace else!”

Maggie had pretty much given up on trying to make sense of the menagerie’s efforts to translate Cybertronian idioms into English. Or even their efforts to convert English idioms into Cybertronian and then back into English -- something always got lost in translation. “Uh huh,” she said instead, arched a brow, and waited.

It took about twelve seconds for Ratbat to start squirming, splayed wings rattling in his confined space. “I don’t want you looking at me with those horrible wet optics, either! Stupid backwards lenses full of stupid weird jelly -- You’re still doing it! Stop it stopstop!”

Maggie shifted a little, settling into a slightly less-uncomfortable spot in her own tiny space. Her neck was going to crick at an angle -- probably permanently -- if she had to stay here long. Fortunately, Ratbat usually ran out of steam pretty fast. “You’re stuck, aren’t you,” she observed at a break in the ranting.

“No!”

“Sure.” Maggie didn’t bother to hide her skepticism. She crossed her arms, trying to figure out what she was looking at. The boards to either side weren’t very large, at least by Cybertronian standards, perhaps as tall as she was. Auxiliary routers, perhaps, meant to help distribute the load, or balance the never-ending flow of comm signals? The mass of cabling that connected the two, however, was dizzyingly complex, a latticework of glowing lines that wove around Ratbat’s round little frame. Some of them were even wound underneath and over his wings. Maggie’s eyes narrowed as she looked the indignant glideframe over. Had Ratbat wanted to get caught? She wouldn’t put it past him--the little mech had obviously not been happy at all the attention being paid to Soundwave’s new human. On the other hand, if he’d wanted to be rescued and fussed over by his carrier, why hadn’t he already called for help?

A new thought occurred to her. Had Ratbat been so determined to finish his repairs, he’d accidentally trapped himself inside?

“I think you got yourself stuck,” Maggie said.

“I did not!”

“Really? ‘Cause you look stuck to me.”

“I’m fine! I can leave whenever I want to,” Ratbat retorted, and tried to scramble free. He got one tiny claw-hand out, wriggling forward, only to let out a frustrated noise as the movement bent the glideplates of his wing at an awkward angle, leaving him even more thoroughly trapped. Subsiding with a rattling huff, he glared at her, his faceplates folding into a frustrated scowl. “I don’t need your help!”

“Ok, fine, I got it.” Maggie lifted her hands placatingly. She was tempted to just leave the little brat there; he’d call for help once he got hungry enough. But … at the same time, she could understand Ratbat’s frustration, at least a little. Could understand wanting to be able to prove yourself, to prove you’re worth something. Hell, she’d come all the way to Cybertron just to prove that she could be more than some bloke’s arm candy. Not that the aliens had cared much what her reasons were.

Most of the aliens. These new ones… well, between the standoff-ish phoenix who still wouldn’t give her the time of day, the twin blue and red jerks who were way too handsy, and a floating jet-manta ray thing… Maggie still wasn’t sure what to make of them, or their caretaker.

She was getting stronger every day, though, exercising muscles she’d never thought she’d use again. Just getting to run again -- god. Soon, she’d be strong enough to… to do something. She wasn’t sure.

“You know what I don’t get? I don’t get why you don’t like my optics. Eyes,” Maggie said, twisting around to duck under something that looked like an enormous car battery, to get a better view of the base of one of the platters. “Crikey, they aren’t half as weird as yours.”

“Nothing’s wrong with my optics!” Ratbat vibrated with rage, wings clattering. “You’re the one who keeps pointing those wet balls of jelly at everyone!”

“Well, at least they don’t glow in the dark,” Maggie pointed out, running her fingers over a couple of big latches. “I don’t get it. I mean, producing light and collecting it with the same apparatus doesn’t make sense from a mechanical standpoint.”

“Does too! You just don’t understand refraction ang--”

“And why do you want to let everyone know what you’re looking at, anyway? Seems weird. Look over here, will you?” she said, probing carefully into the shadowed parts of the latches. She definitely didn’t want to lose a finger to one of these things.

“I don’t want to look at any oozy old organic!” As expected, the light brightened the madder Ratbat got, which was helpful. “And that’s exactly one of the reasons for optic luminescence! I wouldn’t expect you to understand,” Ratbat sniffed.

“What, you do want people to know where you’re looking? How does that make any sense?” Were these rails under the latches? Maybe, it was hard to tell. She tugged experimentally, and then, when that produced no results, jerked harder at a latch.

Ratbat’s wings vibrated with impotent anger. “It’s for cooperative social environments! Helps other mecha see what I want! -- and communication without comms or words and -- gah! You can’t possibly understand!”

“Huh.” Maggie crawled around to the other side of the platter pair. These latches seemed looser, perhaps more promising. A tidbit of trivia floated up from subconsciousness. “We have something that does the same thing.”

“You do not!” Ratbat squeaked indignantly.

“Do too,” Maggie retorted. She twisted herself up, put the heel of one foot against the latch and gave it an experimental push. She really had to find something more shoe-like than the leathery booties she’d made for herself, but as it turned out, it was damn hard to make something that’d fit a human foot. Patchjob’s last effort had looked like a pair of clown shoes. “It’s the whites of our eyes. Most other mammals don’t have them like we do. I read it somewhere, in an old-time book. Helps you tell if people are looking at something, or if they’re scared, or whatever.” She gave another push, grunting a little in effort.

“Pfeh. It’s not the same thing; optics are more expressive! I can control the amount of light I emit--can your dumb jelly-optics do *that*?”

“Well, no,” Maggie admitted.

“See? I told you,” Ratbat said, vindicated. “Just because you squishy organics somehow think that you can imitate real mecha--”

“Hey, now--what?” Maggie stopped shoving at the latch, leaning over to glare in Ratbat’s direction. “We do not. How I act has nothing to do with wanting to be a giant robot, thank you very much!”

“--and act all--all squishy and cute, with your stupid fields and your stupid tactile responses. You’re just another organic that won’t even last a vorn, so there!” Ratbat finished triumphantly.

“Yeah? So what?” Maggie replied, going back to the latch. Maybe if she put her back to that strut, and used it to brace herself … “So we live less than a hundred years. At least we know we need to make the most of it. Unlike *some* mecha who are apparently jealous of their boss’s new organic pet.”

“I am not!”

“Oh, you so are, I can tell,” Maggie told a sputtering Ratbat, as she combed through the flakes of rust and bits scrapmetal crammed in a tight corner, where not even the cleaning drones could reach. As she hoped, her search quickly yielded a broken, flat-ish little bar of steel. Data was more Maggie’s gig than mechanics, but at least she had a firm grasp on the whole concept of leverage. “And I can tell something else, too.”

“You don’t know anything! And I don’t want to even think what your dumb organic processors even--” While Ratbat raged, Maggie wedged the sharp end of the rod under the portion of the latch that was supposed to lift up.

Then she scrunched herself up again, braced her shoulders, and lined up a solid kick against the flat of her makeshift lever. “Don’t think I didn’t hear you, Ratbat. You called humans ‘cute’.”

“I did noooo--!” With a clang, the latch popped open, and one of the huge plates began to slide. Maggie scrambled out of the way as it swiveled open, like an enormous book. Cables tensed up, slack vanishing as the gap suddenly widened And as those cables snapped taut -- they ejected a small purple bat from the slot, like bouncing a bowling ball off a trampoline. “--oooaaaah!”

The little mech clanged off the other side of the small space, and tumbled to the floor with a clatter, wings akimbo. “Oh shi--” Torn between laughter and dismay, Maggie wiggled out of the now much-narrower space beside the plate, and hurried over to him. “Crap--are you okay?” Most of the animal-mecha--symbionts--she’d seen so far were pretty flexible, but they didn’t have near the thick armor that the bigger mecha did. If Ratbat was seriously hurt, Soundwave really *would* kill her. She smoothed fingertips over the top of one wingtip, trying to ease it back so she could see.

Dim red optics stared up at her, brightening as she watched. “-mneroff,” Ratbat said dazedly. Then those optics narrowed. “....hey. You’re smudging my polish!” The wing jerked back out of her grip, even as little clawed feet flailed, trying to get enough purchase to sit up.

“Oh please. Like you aren’t already covered in metal filings and oil,” Maggie scoffed. Expertly dodging the sharp points of Ratbat’s wingtips, she managed to slip her hands underneath. With a grunt of effort, she boosted the little symbiont upright. Ratbat was heavier than he looked. Taking advantage of the glideframe’s disorientation, she swiped the relatively clean back of her hand against one wing, holding it up to show the grit smeared across it. “See?”

“I wouldn’t be so dirty if you hadn’t tried to help!” Ratbat accused right back. “And now you broke the relay again. I’m gonna tell Soundwave.” The glideframe sounded rather smug about that. Maggie lifted an unimpressed eyebrow.

“Uh huh. Not sure that’s going to win you any brownie points with the rest of the crew,” she pointed out. “They already think you’ve been goofing off in here. They’ll probably just think that you broke it and are trying to blame it on me.” Besides, she very much doubted the relay was truly broken. The cables had enough slack that they should be able to reset it back to its closed position without any problems. Sensing Ratbat was gearing up for another tantrum, Maggie continued on. “Tell you what--I’ll cut you a deal.”

“No they wo--what kind of deal?” Ratbat’s narrow-muzzled little face regarded her with a sudden avid interest.

Pushing away the feeling that she’d somehow gotten in over her head, Maggie said, “You help me reset the relay, and neither one of us says anything about this to Soundwave.” She had a feeling that Soundwave wouldn’t care either way, as long as the work had been done and Ratbat hadn’t been injured. Still, no point in rubbing Ratbat’s pointy little nose in that fact. “And in return... I’ll get you all polished up.” She knew where all the stuff was, had watched Soundwave attend to his symbionts more than a few times. Most of the supplies were recognizable -- after all, she’d learned to use pretty much everything during training… and then later, at the Towers.

Yeah, she knew how to use the stuff, but did she want to, after everything that’d happened? On the other hand, if it’d get Ratbat to knock it off…. “Seriously, I’m good with the wax. Even the big guy will sit up and take notice after I’m through with you.”

Ratbat eyed her with beady, crafty little optics. “You can’t do better than Soundwave can.”

“Maybe, maybe not.” She didn’t want to lock herself into providing ‘a better paint job than Soundwave,’ because frankly, that sounded like an invitation for disaster. Letting Ratbat demand for her do it over, based on the bat’s subjective definition of ‘better’… yeah, no. “Guess you won’t be finding out, though....”

“Wait a klik, will you! I’m *thinking* about it.” Ratbat’s whole *body* looked shifty, and Maggie wasn’t even sure how that was possible -- as if his plotting was so epic, it overspilled his processors and oozed out to infuse his entire batty little frame with a generous dose of guile.

“Alright,” Ratbat announced, tiny stub of a tail waggling rapidly in a way that reminded her of a duck. “Alright, I’ll do it. But only if you use--” Maggie could practically hear a sound effect inserted in that pause, an ominous *dun-dun.* “--the glitter.”

“The. Glitter.” Maggie repeated slowly.

“Yes!” The bat eyed her as if doubting her ability to hear properly.

Maggie buried her face in her hands. Glitter. Hell, why not rhinestones too, while they were at it? Maggie’s family had been a large one -- pretty inevitable, given the lack of birth control outside of the enclaves -- and she had enough experience with younger siblings to know when she was facing a potential fashion disaster, at least of the ‘wearing wellies with a party frock’ variety. “You sure you want glitter? I know lots of other really nice techniques we could use …”

Ratbat’s beady optics narrowed. “No. I want glitter. Lots of it.”

“Ok, fine, fine! Glitter it is.” She would just have to figure out some way of using it so that Ratbat wouldn’t end up the laughingstock of his cohort; knowing the little brat, he’d blame her for it, and then they’d be right back where they started. Jesus H. Christ on a dingo. It was like dealing with the most evil, bad-tempered, squash-faced, repellant little princess in the world. Glitter, glitter … wait. Hadn’t she seen something, back in the Tower, some new fashion …. glyphs, that was it! Some of the aliens had taken to having word-symbols painted on the edges of their armor, in tiny interconnected bands. Maggie had seen it a few times, on higher ranking mecha. She’d been reluctantly intrigued: done in subtle iridescent paints, the result had looked more than a little like intricate lacework.

She grinned. “You know, I think I have just the thing.” She might not know the alien language, but she was pretty sure she’d seen some nano-etchers that could be programmed to give her the patterns she needed. “C’mon--let’s clean up this whole mess, and then go get sparkly.”

 

 *******

 

Three hours. Three flybitten hours of digging around for equipment and supplies, finally hooking down just the right canister of glitter -- because apparently not just any glitter would do -- scrubbing a dusty, squirmy, foul-mouthed bat, and then the hard part: buffing in layers of nanite-exfoliants, nanites, wax, and etcher applications until the rotten little creature gleamed.

Only good thing about it: wrangling Ratbat kept Maggie too busy to dwell on the last time she’d had to do this… or on what an awful deal she’d struck. Since when did fifteen minutes of cooperation warrant all this hassle? Even she had to admit, though, the bat looked good. Gleaming like a purple sunset, Ratbat hung upside down in front of a reflective sheet of metal, cackling and squeaking as he admired himself. While the little machine was distracted, Maggie made her escape, with aching muscles and a tingling in her arms so bad she was sure she’d pinched a nerve.

All she wanted was a drink of water, maybe a shower. Was that so much to ask?

Apparently so, Maggie discovered, as the lift took her up to the tabletop she’d claimed as her own. There wasn’t much up here, just a box on its side, a bunch of interesting stuff she’d found, a hoard of food bits, her growing collection of clothing… and the water cooler -- which was twice her height, hummed faintly in the corner, and looked kind of menacing. Despite Patchjob’s assurances, she was more than a little wary of the thing, and the lime green and purple paint job didn’t make it any more friendly-looking, for some reason.

And now it had a golden dragon-phoenix-thing perched on top of it, giving her the stinkeye. Some days it just didn’t pay to get out of bed.

The golden-red bird dipped its head down, examining Maggie with first one glowing green eye, then the other. “Flipsides said you called me a ‘phoenix,’” said the bird. “Is this another of your idioms?”

“Ah--” Maggie scrubbed her wax-smudged hands through her hair, which already stuck up in spikes, so it wasn’t like she could make it any worse. She’d kinda figured that the golden bird-machine couldn’t even talk, because while she’d seen the thing around, it certainly hadn’t been interested in her. But his English was just as flawless as that of all the other symbionts. He even had, weirdly, a bit of an American drawl. “Uhm--not an idiom, exactly. It’s more of a--symbol? A phoenix is an imaginary bird, and well … you look kinda like one, in a mechanical sort of way.” What was this one’s name? Flipsides had made introductions, but there’d been so many of the damn things -- how Soundwave fit *ten* of the little mecha inside him, like an overstuffed broody goose, Maggie wasn’t sure, but it sure as heck didn’t sound very comfortable. The three birds -- not Ratbat, he was something else -- were Buzzsaw, Laserbeak, who had been infinitely more polite, and the third was ‘S’ something. Sunny? Sunroar? Sunder… no, Sundor--that was it.

Sundor drew back, bending his neck into a graceful, swanlike curve in order to eye her from a different angle. Yeah, ‘phoenix’ was definitely about right. Sundor was gorgeous, all dazzling gold, his mirrored plating somehow glowing with brilliant iridescence. He was about as big as Buzzsaw, but more sculpted and lean, like Laserbeak. Even the vaguely draconic, unbirdlike body and tail didn’t detract from those alien good looks, and judging from the self-conscious, artful flare of wings and curve of his neck, Maggie was pretty sure Sundor knew it.

“How can I look like a creature that does not exist?” he said, obviously skeptical.

“Well--no one knows exactly what a phoenix looks like, but some things are always the same in the stories, yeah? It’s a golden bird, or a bird made of fire, or a bird who looks like fire. There’s only ever one, I think? And, um--” Maggie tried to cudgel her brain for the rest of the stories her Nan had told when she was little. “Oh, they’re hatched in fire. And they die in it too -- they lay an egg, and they sit on it, and burn up when it hatches. Or maybe they burn up, and leave behind an egg. And when the egg hatches, a new phoenix comes out of the flames. Either way, there’s a whole lot of fire,” she added drily.

“That is a very complicated life cycle,” the golden bird said. “But fascinating, nevertheless.” He hesitated, and Maggie was struck by the sneaking suspicion that Sundor wasn’t really interested in the natural history of mythological creatures. She waited. Sundor flicked the tip of his tail, light sparking off of the interlocking plates as he pressed on. “And these imaginary creatures--they are considered beautiful?”

Yup, she’d been right. “Uhm, yeah, very beautiful. They’re pretty much symbolic of fire, or of rebirth--so they’re both beautiful and dangerous.” What the heck--a little flattery never hurt, and Sundor was a diva if she ever saw one. Who was she to judge, anyway? She’d used her own looks, more than once, to get out of scrapes, or to get what she wanted. To get out. Maybe it was mercenary, but if there was one thing Maggie had learned growing up poor, it’s that you used any advantage you could find.

Sundor clicked a little to himself, as if in thought. “A surprisingly apt, if primitive comparison,” he decided, tail coiling under the lighting so that it looked like all the colors of an oilslick danced across the gold. The way the hues slid across the fine scales of plating looked oddly familiar, somehow. “Tell me more: is there any creature that compares with the phoenix?”

“Uh. No, definitely nothing like it,” Maggie hedged, trying to figure out how to get this very non-mythological specimen off her water cooler. “The stories say it comes from sandy regions -- deserts, hot places, I think. Not many other creatures can withstand those kinds of conditions. And even if they could, well, in some stories a phoenix can set almost anything on fire.” Or maybe that was dragons. She wasn’t sure. “Nothing’s going to tangle with a phoenix.”

Sundor nodded, seeming pleased. “Sand-covered deserts, you say? If they grow so hot, then your planet must orbit at least one star -- what type?”

“Uh.” Maggie hadn’t been aware that there was any option for ‘planet’ other than ‘goes around a sun.’ “Yes, we’ve got a sun. What kind, I -- well. It’s yellow, kind of the same color as, uhm… the yellow on the tips of your wings. It’s pretty stable, I guess?” Having rather exhausted her knowledge of solar phenomena, Maggie eyed the water tank. “Say, do you mind if I--”

“How does the phoenix fare in the heat of your sun?” Sundor asked, bringing a wingtip forward to inspect the lemon-yellow points of his metal feathers. “According to your tribal legends,” the robot amended.

Maggie felt hard-pressed to keep from heaving a sigh. Was this how aborigines had felt when her own ancestors showed up in Botany Bay and started asking bizarre questions? Well, probably not. Probably most of them were too worried about getting shot to be troubled by early European anthropology. “They’re associated with sunlight. Some of the stories probably started because no one could figure out what the sun even was, or where it went in the evenings. So people thought the sun might be a phoenix.” Or something. Maggie was pretty sure she was making things up at this point.

Sundor’s expression fell midway between charmed and appalled. “Truly? Your species is that ignorant?”

“Hey,” Maggie scowled at him. “We are not. I’m just telling you what people used to believe, back in the olden days. We might not be quite up to your standards, but we know what the sun is.” As fucked up as the world was, they hadn’t lost everything. Not yet. Though if the damn Enclaves hadn’t locked up the libraries, defunded the public universities and the scientists while hoarding their own like chess pieces, then maybe the world could have bounced back, figured out what had gone wrong. Or maybe not. “I told you, they’re stories now. Make believe--stories you tell kids.”

“Why would you tell your offspring of things that don’t exist?” Sundor asked. “Would it not be better to teach them of things that do?”

“I dunno. Maybe because no one can know everything. Maybe because that way they’ll go out looking for a phoenix someday, and discover other things instead. Or maybe just to shut them up so they’ll go to sleep.” Maggie shrugged. “Now if you don’t mind, I need a drink.” Oh boy, did she ever. It was a shame the aliens had never recreated grain alcohol. What she wouldn’t give for a beer right now …. She jerked a thumb at the cooler. “You mind getting your fancy tail out of the way?”

Sundor blinked, then curved his neck to observe the gleaming appendage in question. The bifurcated tip spread and flexed like twin golden prongs. “It is a particularly fancy tail,” he allowed after a moment of self admiration. “Nevertheless, I understand your need to freshen your internal lubricant. You may proceed,” the bird offered magnanimously, flicking his long, reptilian tail away from the dispenser controls.

Uhm. Not quite what Maggie had been going for, there. Making some kind of water bottle was definitely going on her ever-expanding List of Things to Do -- right under ‘figure out how to get a pen and some paper in this place, so I can make an actual list.’ “Internal wha -- err, thanks.” Something clattered to her tabletop behind her little habitation box, and then came a sound like the patter of metal feet coupled with something being scraped. Whatever it was… snuffled squeakily as it ran. Ugh, not again. “Look, I was really angling for some privacy here as well, so if you could all just--”

Sundor *bristled.* His whole body went from glossy, smooth sleekness to jaggedy hedgehog prickles as all those thin leaves of scaly armor stood right up on end. The flat, slicked-back little spines down his head and neck flared up, flashing fins even more vibrantly colored than the rest of the bird as he voiced a rattling hiss. In an instant, Sundor went from playbird to bird-of-war, and Maggie felt alarm crawl her spine, suddenly fearing that she’d said too much, pushed too hard. Fuck, should have--

“Hey! Hey you, organic!” Ratbat came charging around the corner, stubby little feet going like pistons, wingtips bumping along behind him. “You missed a spot right here! I can see it and I want--”

Then Ratbat saw Sundor, and the little bat skidded to a halt. His wings slumped. Then his oversized radar-dish ears fell flat.

Slowly, with all the stealth in his batty little frame, Ratbat tried to edge back around the corner of Maggie’s habitation box.

Maggie blinked as Sundor bristled even further, wings mantling, his hiss rising up into a metallic screech. That screech morphed into a jumble of alien words that sounded like nothing so much as a modem tossed into a blender. Ratbat squawked an indignant reply, chittering.

The response didn’t seem to appease the golden bird. In a gleaming flash, he flowed off the top of Maggie’s water cooler, tiger-powerful, purely predatory. Ratbat made it about one step, little wings flailing, before Sundor was on him, his own wings mantling like liquid hellfire, talons outstretched.

Maggie gaped at the sudden fight, the two mini-mecha tussling fiercely. Ratbat was simply and purely outmatched, at best a third of Sundor’s size, panting squeaky little vents like a rusted hinge as he bit and kicked as the bigger robot pinned him down.

The size difference made it look like a grown person picking on a toddler. “What the -- stop that! Dammit!” The words were out of Maggie’s mouth before she could think better of them. Sundor’s golden head whipped up, emerald optics just pinpoints of fulminating light.

Oh shit.

Caught by surprise at the sudden brief respite, Ratbat cracked one beady little optic open, then blinked at his unexpected savior. Well, even if Maggie ended up torn apart by an angry phoenix, at least she’d get some gratitude from this, right?

“It was HER idea! Ask her!”

Or, you know, not.

“What?” Maggie said, more than a little alarmed. “Okay, just -- everyone calm down. Back up a step. What’s wrong?”

“You polished him--with *my* nanites?” Sundor hissed, eyes glowing like twin emerald meteors. “You wasted my energy absorption nanites on this spoiled, preening ... accountant!?”

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black--Sundor was a fine one to accuse someone else of vanity. Maggie backpedalled. “I--wait, I didn’t know they were yours! Ratbat wanted a polish as part of our deal, and I thought those were the supplies everyone used.” She shot Ratbat a glare of her own. Even half-squashed under the golden bird, the little brat managed to look smug.

“You--!” Sundor’s narrow beaked face swivelled between her and Ratbat, as if unsure whom to blame.

“Look--I’m sorry,” Maggie said, trying to appease the angry mech. “I didn’t realize we were getting into your personal supply. Believe me, it won’t happen again.” She shot Ratbat another annoyed glance. First making her polish until her arms practically fall off, and then throwing her to the wolves--or angry bird-dragon, as the case might be. Oh, Ratbat was definitely going to pay for this! “Look--I can’t do it right now, but …. how about I give you a polish too? A proper detailing, just like Ratbat, so everyone can see how much better you wear your -- uh, your nanites?” It was a desperate appeal to Sundor’s vanity, one that she could only hope would work.

The bird tossed his head. “Are there even any left? It looks like you already wasted them all on *him*,” Sundor hissed, talons tightening on Ratbat’s round chassis.

The glideframe squeaked. “Hey! You’re scratching my--” That sharp-beaked helm swivelled, and Sundor--impossibly--glowed brighter still. Ratbat cut off what he was about to say, optics wide with apprehension.

“It kinda looks that way, doesn’t it?” Maggie said wryly. Ratbat hadn’t been kidding about the glitter--the little brat had insisted on three coats. “But there’s still plenty left, believe me.” Soundwave apparently kept his symbionts well-stocked. The supplies Ratbat had shown her were more than ample to keep all ten of the mini-mecha well-polished and maintained for years, if Maggie was any judge. “C’mon,” she added coaxingly. “Ratbat might not be sorry, but I am. Let me make it up to you?” Which wasn’t completely the truth--she was mostly sorry she’d let Ratbat drag her into this whole mess, rather than the fact that they’d pillaged Sundor’s sacred paint. But self-interest was enough to make her play peacekeeper. After all, Soundwave hadn’t said anything about what would happen to her once he learned what he wanted to know about humans. If he sold her again … if she disappeared into another cage ... .

She shook away the thought, refusing to acknowledge the cold pit it left in her stomach. Here and now, that was all that mattered. And if playing nice with Soundwave’s crazy horde of animal-mecha kept her out of a cage, then that’s what she’d do. “What do you say? You know I was trained in the Towers. You already outshine bat-boy, here. Give me half a chance, and I’ll polish you up so well that you’ll knock ‘em dead. And I’ll even tell you the story of the, uh, the phoenix while we’re at it.”

Some of those bristling plates slicked down, lowering to only half mast. Sundor hadn’t moved, but that helm tilted contemplatively. He gave a considering series of clicks. “Very well. I wish to hear more of this phoenix. And while normally only Soundwave is allowed to touch my plating-- your species’ reputation precedes you. I will give you your chance.”

Great. Just her luck; leave the Tower, only to end up surrounded by fucking prima donnas. “Sounds like we got a deal.” She hesitated. “You are gonna let Ratbat up sometime this year, right?”

Sundor gave the smaller mech underneath him another considering hiss. Ratbat glared right back, snapping little fangs up at the bird-mech. “I TOLD you it wasn’t my fault. Now let me up!”

Sundor gave another metallic-edged rumble of discontent, but stepped off Ratbat’s round chassis, wings flaring outward. Ratbat shot out from under him like a squirting watermelon seed, stubby little legs going so fast they were just a blurr. Cackling in squeaky triumph, the bat lifted off, just one flap sufficient to lift him cleanly into the air despite his round frame and -- Maggie knew -- considerable mass.

Maggie sighed. “Man--I wish I knew how you guys did that.” Antigravs were everywhere on Cybertron: from small ones tinier than her fingertip to massive engines that held aloft entire buildings. The aliens treated them all as perfectly ordinary, but Maggie still positively itched to take one apart and find out how it worked. “You all make flying look so easy,” she said wistfully, watching Ratbat hurtle out the door.

Sundor snorted. “You have not seen us fly enough, if you think *that* was elegant.” He spread his own feathers, angling them so that the light glittered over them in a cascading sheen. “But if your work is as good as you claim, perhaps I will take you aloft. You may prepare yourself; I will return in five joors.”

And with that, Sundor leaped elegantly skyward, a gleaming, twisting firebolt. “Whaa--how?” Maggie managed to mouth, her words lost to the gusting wind as the mechanical bird performed a powerfully practiced loop and jetted away, agile as a barn swallow despite his size.

Then a more relevant thought occurred to Maggie. “Wait, how long is a joor?”

But the door had already irised open, and Sundor was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

“Rust-humping… son of a toaster --ugh!-- skew-wheeled excuse for a bingled shag wagon--” Maggie aimed a frustrated kick at the cleaning drone. Heavily burdened, the machine wobbled a few skittering steps sideways, spidery legs going every which way. Catching its balance and possibly spotting a stain, the tabletop-with-legs tried to saunter off, its burden swaying precariously. 

“Oh no you don’t -- dammit!” Maggie lunged, grabbed at one of the braided metal ropes she’d used to secure all her stuff to the creature’s back. Clicking and chirping like a demonic cuckoo clock, the cleaning drone staggered to a halt, shorter front legs waving disconsolately as Maggie hauled it back towards the lift.

As it turned out, five ‘joors’ was long enough for a good, lengthy nap, which Maggie had sorely needed. Finding that out, however, had taken the better part of an hour: first to get out of the workshop, then to walk down the corridor to the sun room where she’d last seen Ravage. The huge cat was still there, still curled up in the same spot, and still willing to answer her questions, thank God. Then she had to plod back to her box, another virtually-transatlantic journey. 

All together, the six rooms and linking corridors of Soundwave’s ‘quarters’ were probably a solid ten acres, around the size of the family farm back on earth. And while that didn’t seem huge, absolutely everything was built for machines that were either larger than her, stronger than her, could fly, or some combination thereof. And *that* meant there were way too many things to climb over or weave around. Even getting over the door jamb took a minute, wobbly as her legs still were.

Anyway, a nap. And a shower, meal of cube bits, a piss, and all of a sudden she was running late for Sundor’s detailing, which would have been fine, except that it looked like a bucket of green jello had exploded all over the common work area she’d been planning on using. The stuff was like jellied superglue. Two of the creepy cleaning drones, the kind that normally folded up into child-sized hollows along the walls, were trapped in the sticky stuff. The things buzzed and rattled as they scrubbed with ineffectual determination at the area they could reach, which wasn’t much, and didn’t leave her with any place to work. When she found whoever had spilled the green goo and then just *left it* (she suspected Buzzsaw) she was going to Have Words, oh yes she was. 

So, her tools were going to have to go back to her place, which at least was clean. But carrying all the canisters and brushes that she wanted to use … would take a bunch of trips, and time she didn’t have. 

There was only one possible solution, as far as Maggie was concerned. That was how she’d ended up dragging a cleaning drone behind her, the unhappy thing wobbling under the weight of buckets and brushes, everything lashed in place with a coil of bendy wire rope. Also, its two front legs were shorter than the others. Maggie had to free it from the goo somehow, after all, and the easiest way to do that… was simply unlatch the last joints of its two stuck legs. 

Of course, the cleaning drone had promptly tried to stagger farther into the goo, which led Maggie to tie a lead to it as well. If she lost Sundor’s heavy-ass can of nanites to the sticky green sea, she rather doubted the news would go over well. And she figured she could drag the drone-spider-crab… thing along fairly well; it really wasn’t much larger than a dog after all. 

She hadn’t, however, counted on the fact that the thing was a *cleaning* drone. It cleaned. It cleaned with single-minded focus, a devotion that Maggie might have admired if it weren’t for the fact that all her tools were tied atop the damn thing. 

Panting, Maggie hit the button for her lift. Her makeshift pack drone fired up its cleaning pads and, with a hopeful air, tried to slink away again on its lopsided legs, buffing the floor as it went. “Oh for--” She yanked on the lead again, digging in her heels to keep the drone on her side of the lift. It was more than a little like dragging her family’s old mule about, back on Earth. And this stupid thing couldn’t even be bribed with a handy carrot or -- wait a minute. Couldn’t it? 

Five minutes and multiple small globs of touch-up paint later, Maggie finally got the drone up and over to ‘her’ portion of the platform. She squirted another couple of blobs onto the table to keep the drone happily buffing away in one spot while she tied it off to the nearest support. 

Perched high above, Sundor twisted his long neck downward, his narrow-beaked golden face eyeing her at a weird, upside-down angle. 

“You’re late,” he said accusingly.

“Yeah, well not everyone has wings to zoom around on,” Maggie retorted. “Some of us actually have to *walk* to get places in this oversized zoo.”

“You may have a point. I suppose I cannot fault you for your structural deficiencies,” Sundor said after a moment’s consideration. The drone, having finished its buffing, tried to skitter off, only to be brought up short by the tether. It strained against the lead, servos whining unhappily. That narrow golden helm turned, swivelling right-side-up once more, glowing green optics spiralling down to focus on the thing. “And what, precisely, do you think you’re going to do with *that*?” That suspicious glare turned to her. “If you think I’m going to let that thing anywhere near my plating …”

“Oh for--cool your jets, will you?” Maggie snapped as she stepped around the drone and began undoing knots, lifting canisters off of the thing’s flattish top. “I just needed some way to haul all these supplies, and it was the only thing handy.” The drone lurched again, this time in a different direction, and she swore as the wire rope slipped through her hands. “Sonofa--!”

Sundor lifted his head, his neck curving into a swanlike arc. He said something in Cybertronian--a quick crackle of staccato sibilants--and the drone suddenly stopped moving, spiderlike legs folding obediently underneath as it sank down onto the tabletop, golden sensor-pits blinking into standby.

A bit startled by the sudden assist, Maggie shoved a stray hank of hair out of her face. “Huh. Wish I’d known that little trick.” She gave Sundor a sidelong glance. “Thanks. That makes things easier.”

Sundor flicked the tip of his tail in an oddly catlike motion. “Of course.” He paused, obviously considering something. “Afterwards, I shall show you the codes for summoning a carrydrone. Assuming you are sufficiently skilled in signals and systems to use them?”

“Of course I am,” Maggie snapped to cover her confusion, heaving the last piece -- Sundor’s special can of nanites -- off the quiescent drone’s back. Systems? Signals, at least, she understood -- that sound had to be some kind of signaled code. It wasn’t something that she could repeat back herself, but she’d taken apart a few cassette recorders in her time. There had to be some kind of magnetic tape around here somewhere, enough that she could jury-rig some kind of playback device, something she could carry around with her. “So, how come that guy is, erm, special? Because I gotta say, you speak a whole lot more English than he does.”

Sundor stared at her. It wasn’t real easy to tell expressions on a reptile-bird, but he seemed … taken aback? Baffled? “It is a drone, as we have told you.” Sundor said slowly. “Higher orders of communication are beyond its coding.” The plates along that long, flexible spine were hackled upwards slightly, as bafflement turned into indignation. “You honestly believe we would enslave a spark into such mindless tasks?” 

Maggie bit back the retort that wanted to escape--Why wouldn’t I? Isn’t that what you do to us?--stuffing it behind her teeth. Sundor was prickly enough as it was; venting her anger now would do nothing but destroy their fragile truce. “Yeah, well, I thought you meant that it was, yanno, infertile. Not one of those creators. Okay, this should be steady enough.” She gave the section of railing she’d wedged atop a sled a solid thump. 

“You say exceedingly strange things,” Sundor stated flatly. He regarded Maggie’s makeshift polishing stand with a dubious look and then, venting in a way that sounded rather a lot like a put-upon sigh, glided down. 

Maggie had to give the bird-dragon one thing -- he was an awesome sight. Quite literally. In motion, he had a kind of fiery brilliance that made her suck in a little breath, that made her recall half-remembered biblical chapters and the fiery angels that made men grovel, or swords that kept living-flame watch over a garden forever beyond the reach of mortals. Only his eyes weren’t gold--instead they were green, ever-changing and luminous against the golden planes of that sharp-beaked face. 

She was almost hesitant to touch him -- but the bird’s shoulder was cool to the touch. Each small metal plate, few larger than her palm and most closer to the size of her thumbnail, was smooth and slick as water. The dominant color was gold -- like his eyes, it seemed inwardly-illuminated somehow -- but there were other colors too, oranges and reds, even green and violet that seemed to linger in the shadows her fingertips cast. The tingling made her palm feel warm. “I’m not sure I can do a whole lot better than this,” Maggie admitted.

Sundor half-spread his wings, mantling in what might have been encouragement. “Few could,” he allowed. “Nevertheless, you have the opportunity to try.”

Maggie had seen Sundor’s particular brand of effortless haughtiness enough by now that it was more amusing than annoying. “Er, thanks,” she managed, picking up a canister of mild detergent to start stripping the outer layers of sealant and topcoat away. “So how do you get all these colors? Those nanites--” that she’d inadvertently put on Ratbat “--were just kind of glittery yellow.”

“They are machines all their own, though mindless, like your drone.” Sundor inclined his wedge-shaped head as Maggie went to work. “A mech who applies them simultaneously applies a charge, altering their voltages, and thus their surface characteristics.”

Maggie looked down to where she was wiping color away, leaving a matte yellow basecoat. Which was nice enough, but it wasn’t anything so impressive as the bird’s normal colors. Oh, this was just great. She swallowed. “I… hate to break it to you, Sundor, but that’s, uhm. Not something I can do.”

Sundor cast her a sly, sidelong glance. “I imagine you will figure something out,” he said, standing up a little higher to present his flank. “Make sure you get between all the toplinks of my tail. I’m told that can be quite a challenge.”

Bugger. With few other options open to her, Maggie scrubbed and polished, fuming. Sundor was right -- there were a lot of places on him where small parts slid across or overlapped even smaller ones. The top of his tail was not even the worst of it, and she had to scritch under each guardplate with her nails or her smallest little dentist-tools to get all the old topcoat. Face and neck were even harder. The wings, spearhead tailtip, and crest were actually easiest: they at least were long plates, though they split in unexpected ways under her fingers, like separating a bundle of feathers. Sundor purred all the while in very evident enjoyment, which Maggie might have appreciated another time, but it sure wasn’t helping her think. A final sprinkling of solvent and a good rubdown with microfiber to remove any final flakes, a quick touchup on the basecoat in the few places it was needed… and then there was just the canister of special nanites and one expectant, dull yellow bird-dragon.

She’d cleaned those three-inch claws, and had no desire to see them anywhere near, say, her eyes. With a sense of foreboding, Maggie dipped her brush into the fine powder and drew it along Sundor’s feathery tailtip flare, watching the shine as the powder bonded itself to his basecoat. It was definitely gold, and definitely pretty. It was not, however, particularly remarkable. “Uh, so did you want to hear more about phoenixes, or--”

“I should prefer to converse about something else, I believe,” Sundor said, snaking his neck around, apparently unconcerned by the stripe of plain gold on his tail. “Do you know the nature of a primitive transistor?”

It took a moment for the question to filter through Maggie’s worrying. “Okay one, don’t call them primitive. I mean, we used to have a civilization based on them, for Chrissake. And two, it’s not like I know all the metals involved, but basically it’s just using a small signal to control a bigger one at some terminals.” 

“Can you draw such a device?” Sundor pressed.

“Well, yeah,” Maggie said, thinking to the old motherboard and chipset diagrams her Da had sometimes managed to bring back from scavenging trips to Sydney’s bombed out suburbs. She’d been lucky, in a way -- the local farms and the schoolhouse hadn’t really been touched in the whole North Korea shelling thing, not that she was really old enough to remember that. All of New South Wales had just kind of… gradually drifted into isolation after that, especially as first the rains, then the wheat and other crops had failed. The Long Drought had made pumps pretty damned important and maintaining them difficult, so her Da hadn’t complained much when she spent more time with machinery than with the never-ending housework; survival was a damn good reason for her to learn everything she could. At least, until she was old enough to be married off. 

“Basically, you’ve gotta have an emitter at one end…” the three stacked lines fit nicely at the tip of Sundor’s tail, “and then here’s the base, with the voltage to control the current, and the collector terminal.” She got to the edge of the thin metal feather, and added the jagged peaks and valleys of a resistor to keep from running out of room. 

“I see,” Sundor said, fanning the spear-like tip of his tail into a pair of feathery prongs, then back again. “It doesn’t seem to be very useful, however. You can’t compare the signals.”

“So you think!” Maggie took up the brush to prove him wrong. “You just take your digital inputs, like this, ladder them with resistors like this, input an analog signal here, then chain them to a comparator output.”

“What about control of a direct current motor?” Sundor queried. 

The answer took her up Sundor’s tail, and adding the circuitry to reverse the spin of a motor armature made her wrap all the way around. She ended up having to overlay some parts, but that was fine -- the nanites took some time to bond, so the newly-painted stripes were a little darker than the older ones. She explained and drew the insides of XOR gates, attached them to voltage dividers, field effect transistors, battery piles, doing her best to answer the golden bird's never-ending questions. Mapping out the circuitry of an analog tape recorder--while simple enough that she could probably build one--took pretty much all of Sundor’s underside, wingtip to wingtip. Talking about the circuits stirred up old memories too, things lost to her long captivity, and she did her best to describe and draw the chipsets of things she’d once taken apart. 

Eventually, she ran out of space, every inch of the dragon-bird coated in so many layers in assorted stages of drying so that she couldn’t tell one circuit from another. By the time she’d finished applying the clear topcoat, one thing was pretty obvious, though -- Sundor was going to be solid, bright gold. It certainly wasn’t bad, every immaculate plate gleamed with a mirror shine, but … somehow she didn’t think it was going to be up to the vain mech’s exacting standards. 

With a last brushstroke down the dazzling length of one wingplate, Maggie stepped back to evaluate her work. 

Sundor arched his neck around, peering at his wings and the rest of his frame. “You have certainly proven your skill,” Sundor said, flaring his wings proudly, tail lashing in a single, graceful arc. Then that golden helm turned, bright emerald optics assessing her own bedraggled, paint-smeared state. “Your result is everything you promised it would be. Yet you are not happy. Why?”

“Why?” Maggie knelt to start packing up supplies. Her mouth was dry -- too much talking, probably, over the last, what, six hours? “I guess it just brought up too many memories. Describing those transistors, I mean. I used to be something more than a fancy paint-and-sex slave, y’know. I used to solve real problems, in ways that helped people.” She screwed on canister lids with savage little twists, thumping them into their crate. 

“But did you not volunteer yourself for such duties?” Sundor retorted, head cocked. 

“Yeah, I did, but--” Maggie sat back on her heels, assessing the golden phoenix above her. She’d told other ‘bots the truth before, and it hadn’t made one speck of difference. They’d never cared for anything except what they wanted. She’d be a fool to expect this self-absorbed prima donna to be any different. Still, he was being nice about the whole one color thing, at least. What could it hurt? 

“Yeah, I signed up,” she confessed. “It was my only way out. I know there’s no way you can understand, but there was nothing where I was. I mean, some of the things I did helped, a little, but then… well, but there was nothing in my future but dust and hard living. And then you guys came. You had these amazing machines--you WERE these amazing machines. You could fly around the world with a thought, travel between the stars, speak in ways we couldn’t even hear. Your coding languages must be--” she stopped short, embarrassed at everything she’d let slip. “Anyway, that’s why. I wanted to learn. You all know so much, and even if I had to clean, I thought I’d still be able to … anyway.” 

“Fascinating,” Sundor said, oddly intent. “So service is not your function?”

That garnered him a stinkeye. “No. My function is definitely not to ‘service’ anybody. Or anything. I don’t care how good I look or how tight my ass is.”

“Other humans find you attractive?” Sundor looked her up and down, surveying her with renewed interest. Oddly enough, the look wasn’t offensive; perhaps because unlike most of the men of her acquaintance--and a few women--that assessment seemed to skip entirely over her breasts and ass in favor of entirely non-erogenous zones. If anything, the bird-dragon seemed to linger more on her feet and hands than anything else. “You are … pleasingly symmetrical, I suppose?” he offered. “Your digits are ridiculously fragile, but they seem to be very finely made.”

Maggie snorted, amused in spite of herself. “Well, that’s one way of putting it.” She shrugged. “What about you? Would you ever stay with a … a carrier, if all he wanted from you was a trophy? Something to ride his shoulder and look pretty?” Hell, for all she knew maybe that’s all Sundor did. But somehow, Soundwave didn’t strike her as the type of person--robot--to collect pretty-but-useless trophy wives. Or symbionts, as the case might be.

Sundor’s plating flared, spined golden hackles rising with a clatter, and his reply was immediate and sure. “Never.”

“Yeah. Me neither.” She tossed a few more brushes and mesh-clothes into the box, then hefted it up to put on the drone.

“These designs you drew, for the simple gates and circuits, these are activities from which you derive satisfaction?” Sundor seemed to change the subject, watching her every move.

Solving hardware and software problems, harnessing metal and electricity in ways that no one left on Earth could teach her? “Quit calling them simple, seriously. But yeah, pretty much.” She nodded at Sundor’s paintjob, all the overlapping strokes now vanished. “For all the good that does anyone.” 

Sundor seemed thoroughly baffled, looking from her to his gleaming flank and mantled wings. He glanced up suddenly, and Maggie got the impression he might have sent a question to one of the other symbionts. His crest drooped a little, as if he were abashed. “I neglected to consider the capabilities of your optics,” the dragon-bird admitted. “You cannot visually detect electrical current?”

“Uh, no,” said Maggie. “Well, not unless there’s a whole lot of it jumping through the air, like lightning or something.” 

“I… while you painted, I took the liberty of arranging the nanite populations to convey surface current, as if they were the primitive structures you described,” he said, almost sheepishly, then straightened, spreading both wings to their fullest span. “It did not occur to me that you could not see. Now if I can… just…” Sundor clicked something to himself, like a person muttering. 

Maggie felt her brows drawing together. Though to be honest, she’d thought that Sundor would have given her a headache long before this. “I told you, quit calling them prim--” she started.

And then the bird lit up. 

It started at the pyramid lines of emitters, the stacked long and short marks that symbolized the piles of a battery. The glyphs glowed, suddenly seeming alien, just pulsing every shade of gold as they demarked power, like Maggie could see the electrons building… and then flowing downstream, lighting up the circuits one by one. They raced along the channels she’d carefully drawn, splitting brief crimson at the OR gates, converging at the comparators. The motor armatures she’d drawn began to spin, slowly at first for playback, and then settling into measured synchronicity for record. The ohms were all visible now, packets moving, building, flowing over the resistors like water pooling behind a dam, spilling over the floodgates in scintillating blues and greens. Terminals of the coupling capacitor sparked orange, bold and beautiful, beating over his chest.

Sundor was a phoenix once again, incandescent, covered in the symbols as if his inner workings were mapped across his plating. The painted circuits looked like tribal tattoo markings, both strikingly primitive and yet balanced, eye-catchingly beautiful all lit up like this. In that moment, Maggie could not recall seeing a more awe-inspiring sight in all her life.

“I am pleased,” the mechanical phoenix stated, wingtips raised in a great sweeping arc of fiery incandescence. “You have demonstrated your skill well. And I have come to believe that, in some ways, you and I are not so dissimilar. Name your favor, and if it is within my power, I shall see it accomplished.”

Maggie’s mouth opened and closed. She would realize later that maybe she should have asked for passage back to Earth, or… or something else. She wasn’t sure what. But what came out of her mouth in that moment was, “Can you show me how you do that?” All of these amazing, effortless things the aliens could do without even thinking; she was tired of guessing, of being surprised again and again. She wanted to *know*, to learn how they worked. Maybe it was greedy, but there was such a huge universe beyond Earth--even now, she’d only seen such a tiny bit of it. 

Sundor twisted his head, neck bending into a elegant--and somewhat quizzical--curve. “Certainly, although--hmm. We may need some visual aids, given the limitations of your optics.” He glanced over at the drone. “It seems we will require some transportation. I shall call Soundwave to assist us.”

“What? Wait, no--that’s not what I--”

As if he had been waiting for the sound of his name, Soundwave appeared, the daggered planes of his frame rounding the corner as the carrier entered the room. Maggie had gotten used to how noisy the aliens were. Even the quiet ones creaked and hummed and made little metallic rattles, just by existing. But Soundwave was so quiet, it was eerie. All she could hear was an almost subliminal hum from his internals, the faintest whirring. Even those broad pedes barely made a sound, compared to the heavy tromping footsteps of the other mecha she’d known. Well, except for Ravage--maybe he was to blame? If he’d been teaching his boss how to sneak up on people--wait. “Focus, Maggie,” she muttered, and lifted her chin, refusing to show how much the big mech unnerved her.

“Assistance, requested?” Soundwave asked. A shiver rippled down her spine at the dispassionate, mechanical edge to those words.

“The human -- Maggie, I mean -- wants to learn how our nanites work, boss,” Sundor reported. “We’re going to need a data station in her size and some remedial files. Can you help me take her to pick some out?”

Those visored optics turned, looking her over. “Human memory, capable of retaining such information?”

Sundor did a complicated gesture with his wings, the spiked spinal plates lifting with them in a rippling movement that looked like nothing so much as a shrug. “I’m not sure--maybe? But I promised she could have whatever she wants, and that’s what she wants. Should be interesting to find out.”

Maggie stiffened her back. “Okay, first, I can definitely remember stuff. Second, I can get down and go -- wherever we’re going on my damn own.”

The big mech took a slow step forward, and Maggie tensed, ready to make a break for it the moment it looked like she was going to be grabbed. But Soundwave only sat down on one of the giant, three-meter-high stools, wing-like panels tucking behind him. He folded his wickedly-taloned hands one over the other in his lap. That dark, blank mask seemed to suck up all the light in the room.

“Humans, very capable,” the mech ventured. “Pride in achievements, well-deserved.” The words almost didn’t make sense given that voice -- like a combination of every horror movie monster ever, with a metal growl overlay. It was like the nightmare creature in the closet was politely buttering her up, and hell if Maggie knew what to make of that. “Destination, more easily reached with assistance.”

“I’ll walk, thanks,” Maggie shot back, giving Sundor a side-stinkeye for getting her in this mess. But the bird was obliviously admiring his own brilliant plating. He seemed to be experimenting with various parts of the painted circuit map, turning sections on or off. 

Soundwave didn’t so much as twitch a muscle. Tensor, whatever. Creepy as fuck. “Storage rooms, down public hallways,” he insisted obliquely. “Maggie, wishes to select her own tools?”

Goddammit. “Well, yeah. But fuck if I’m going to get carried around again, like a-- a--” a piece of meat, a fucking toy -- literally, in her case. Not that any of her new owners had made any attempts to do the fucking part, which … was something, at least.

Soundwave’s visor dipped, like he was examining his own laced fingers. “Maggie, would consider riding on shoulder?” 

Maggie did a double-take. She looked doubtfully up at the shoulder in question. It *was* pretty big and flat, with plenty of pointy bits to hold on to. But--she would be up really high, once Soundwave stood up. And it wasn’t like the aliens came equipped with guard rails. If she fell off--

Ok, if she fell off, Soundwave would probably catch her. It would be a waste of credits to let her go splat, after all. And … it would be nice, to see the world the same way the aliens did, instead of staring at ankle-joints all the time.

“... I’m so going to regret this, but … okay. I’ll sit on your shoulder,” Maggie said slowly. She was still a mess from painting Sundor, but Soundwave didn’t appear to care, so … “Only--how do I get up?” 

Soundwave extended one hand, and Maggie flinched back instinctively as she saw those sharp-edged talons heading towards her. The big mech paused, gauging her reaction--then turned his hand over, setting it on the tabletop next where she was, fingertips curled safely under. The back of that hand was covered in plates that were relatively smooth, and Soundwave’s arm made a broad--if somewhat treacherous--bridge up to his shoulder, as long as she didn’t mind doing some climbing. 

“Ok, that works,” she admitted. With a last wary look up at that impassive alien face, Maggie dusted off her hands, grabbed the nearest edge, and began to climb. It was--surprisingly difficult. By the time she finally pulled herself up onto that shoulder, it felt like her heart was going to beat out of her chest, her breathing harsh and fast. But she did it, and without any help, which was rather satisfying. Settling herself next to an upthrust edge, she checked to make sure it was clear of any other plates that might slide closed and crush her hand--then wrapped her hands around the projection. “I’m ready,” she said, trying to sound confident. 

“Soundwave: acknowledges,” came the reply--which was even creepier up close. Very slowly, with aching care, Soundwave straightened, rising to his pedes. Maggie hung on for dear life, fingers gripping in a white-knuckled death-grip as they went higher, and higher. It wasn't really anything like riding on a mule - smoother, and yet she could feel the vibrations as relays engaged down in the mech’s substructure, huge girders and engines working in perfect unison to produce motion.

Once Soundwave was upright, she glanced downward, and had a moment of vertigo. She was at least six meters up off the ground, and the change in perspective was … dizzying. 

“Status: secure?” Soundwave asked, turning his head--very carefully--to assess how well she was doing. The voice was still cold and mechanical--but Soundwave was speaking much more quietly, she realized belatedly, so as not to shout her off her perch.

“Umm--I think ...” She shifted a bit, settling herself. Her metal seat wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it felt secure enough, as long as Soundwave continued being careful. “Ok, I’m good. Are we going?”

“Affirmative.” With a slow turn, Soundwave headed out towards the door, Sundor launching himself into the air and swooping ahead of them both. They walked down a long corridor, each step so smooth Maggie hardly felt it, and Maggie found the change in perspective fascinating. Things that were unrecognizable from the ground, that seemed like nothing but tall, endless expanses of metal plate, resolved themselves into banks of equipment, cabinetry, monitors taller than entire human buildings. While she didn’t know how any of it worked, and certainly some things were very strange and definitely industrial-looking, a lot of it was surprisingly recognizable. A door was still a door and a window was a window, after all--even if it looked out on an alien world full of metal.

From up here, she could see the patterns all over the walls, as well. For the first couple of days, she’d thought them markers of some sort, like ‘this end up’ or whatever. Now, though, the layout of color seemed too chaotic to be writing. Art of some kind, maybe? One of them in particular -- it looked like an enormous square of flooring had been cut out and stuck on the wall… but not before a troop of about a dozen symbionts had stepped in various colors and tracked them all over the surface. There were plenty of little multicolor hand and foot prints, several kinds of claws, feathery wingtip prints, some unidentifiable marks, and what could only be the imprint of Ravage’s paws, skidding through paint spatters as they chased one unfortunate little pair of guilty bootprints. The paint seemed old, like the huge rectangle of metal had been kept for a long time. 

Maybe she had been bought by the crazy cat lady after all, because it looked like there was a story there, but then they were at the big double doors that she still remembered from when she’d been brought in via cage. The door slid silently open at some unheard command, and Sundor went gliding through at waist height, his back, neck, long tail, and wings so bright they lit up the hallway, like a living flame with somewhere to be. 

Soundwave followed after. Each step was so smooth that Maggie scarcely felt each thud of foot on floor - and there was a heck of a lot out here to distract her anyway. The ‘hallway’ was probably twenty meters wide and almost that tall, very industrial or maybe just functional in appearance, like the inside of a huge ship. There were pipes, exposed girders, weird boxes, and alcoves on the ceiling and walls, and some kind of raised grid on the floor. The whole space was colored in various shades of metal, dark and bright--silvery metals, coppery ones, greenish, or bluish gray, a few snaking golden yellow pipes here and there. It was nothing like the vivid cacophony of colors that the Towers liked to display.

Well, except for the other mecha. Maggie stiffened at the sight of the first one, rounding the corner up ahead. That one was orange, walking bent over a hand-held foldable screen-thingie, and -- Maggie could actually look down on him. That was a first. 

The mech looked up as they passed, and made an ‘eep!’ sound. He jerked into some kind of stance that was probably supposed to be formal, but ended up fumbling his paper-thing instead. And then they were past him, and Maggie couldn’t crane her head far enough to look past Soundwave’s wing-like panels. 

Okay. So, maybe not the crazy cat lady, after all. 

They passed other giant robots too, most of whom stood aside and tried to look respectful or busy, or both. It was … oddly gratifying, having aliens kowtowing to them, even if the respect wasn’t for her. Weird looking doorways and more hallways went by on either side, some large, some smaller than Soundwave’s. The big robot seemed to know where he was going, though, because he didn’t even pause at the junctures. This place was huge, whatever it was, and--

\--another doorway whooshed open for them, the lights inside flickering on, one bank at a time. Sundor swooped ahead of them like a fireball, but Maggie had eyes only for the equipment and parts laid out on shelves before her, just everything she could imagine and a whole bunch of stuff she couldn’t, going so far back she couldn’t even see the end. Crikey.

All of it was miniaturized, symbiont size. And that meant her size. 

“You’re going to need some input devices, first. We’ll remap them to your language. Pick whatever you like; we’ll take the things you choose back to our place, and you can sort them better there,” Sundor called to her, carving through the air on a wingtip to spiral around his carrier. “Come on, this way!” Soundwave headed towards a particular bit of shelving, lights and equipment humming to life -- despite clearly not being plugged in anywhere -- as they approached. “So do you want the basic primer on the structures and functions of surface nanites, or do you want to start with primitive proto-structures and early development before diving into modern nanomachinery?” Sundor asked, hovering effortlessly overhead.

Eyes fixed on the human-sized banks of machinery -- great piles of square-ish things that could maybe be keyboards, blank screens of every size and shape all stacked in rows, other things like blank picture frames and slotted bars, and was this anything like what big datacenters had looked like, back before the Troubles?--Maggie didn’t realize she was leaning forward until her feet began to slip downwards. “Yes,” she breathed, readjusting her grip. She known she’d wanted this--she hadn’t realized just how much until it was right in front of her. 

“Yes to which?” Sundor asked, tilting his head.

“Yes to all of it. I want to see it all.” Wanted to take them apart and put them back together, to see how they worked, how they might be improved, if only in her head, to learn their inner workings… and more, to use all of this to tease apart the technology and code that made the aliens so -- so capable, so able to casually do things that no one had ever dreamed before. 

Sundor made a metallic trill, a rippling cascade of sound, light and playful. “You sound like one of us. It’s too bad your wet-wired brain cannot handle direct data transfers.” He tilted a wing, gliding gracefully down to the station.

Soundwave looked down at her. “Visual-based data transmission, available,” he assured her. “Soundwave: will provide all the data you require.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A thousand thanks for all the lovely encouragement -- thank you for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

“All right, so. If your humans are indeed… settling in well,” continued Steeljaw, giving Ratbat a very sidelong glance, “that still leaves the layout of the Austinite tower. We have everything publically available and a few things that aren’t; the layout, the conduits, the hookups to Kalis utilities. But we need to know the things that aren’t in any databases -- whatever they’re keeping secret, any portals, rooms, and access to them. Anyplace they could be keeping… certain things.”

“Well…” Ratbat eyed the datapad shiftily, wing claws spread wide to hook the sides. Handling complex calls on internal comms used up too many threads, in his opinion, and besides -- Ratbat checked the outgoing data. Oh yes, it looked very nice when he stood right on the inclined surface of the pad and loomed, all mantled like this. Yes, very nice. Very nice indeed. He would take all his calls this way, Ratbat decided. “No.”

Steeljaw vented quietly. “We could trade you twelve orns of trawling the black markets in Vos in the 14900’s--” he started.

“Got that already,” Ratbat interrupted, beady little optics narrow.

“--or observations from the floor of the Tellorian seedcrystal market for the last vorn--”

“Got that too!” Ratbat squeaked triumphantly.

Steeljaw shook out his mane of sensor-ribbons, claws scraping the tabletop where he stood, half a world away. “Perhaps you could tell me what you’d take in exchange?” he said, unsuccessfully trying to hide his impatience.

“Well--” Ratbat took an astrosecond to savor the moment. “Since you don’t have anything that I wa--oomph!” A big, taloned paw seemed to come out of nowhere, peeling him right off the viewscreen.

A scuffle ensued, punctuated by Ratbat’s thoroughly indignant squeaking. “Hey! You go away this is my call and I was talking--” Stubby purple pedes flailed with mighty rabbit kicks at one corner of the viewscreen for a moment, before pale-scaled coils looped over them. Then, dark as midnight itself, a cybercat flowed up into range of the pickups, all blades and grace.

“Ravage,” Steeljaw tilted his golden head in acknowledgement, and, as an elegant serpentframe raised his own narrow, death-pale helm behind the dark bladeframe’s shoulder, “Erasure.”

“Steeljaw,” Ravage replied, ebony faceplates inscrutable. “I find myself curious. Why exactly are you asking for the layout and security codes for the Austinite tower?”

“It doessn’t have anything to do with the remarkable collection of humanss they are rumored to have amassed, I’m ssure,” Erasure added, looping another coil over a flailing purple wingtip.

“Of course not,” Steeljaw answered, settling his mane. “Although, if there were …” He tilted his helm, emerald optics gleaming as he regarded the other symbionts. “Would you want in?”

Ravage studied the other bladeframe. The pause, punctuated by Ratbat’s indignant squeaking, stretched. “Perhaps.”

The golden symbiont ruffed his plating -- his extraordinarily clean, buffed plating -- in a dry expression of humor. “Yours have gotten to you too, haven’t they?”

“In what sense?” Ravage replied, neatly deflecting the question. “Humans are interesting enough to study, if that is what you mean. Provided one’s foci are inclined towards short-lived organic species.” He sat, the heavy-bladed end of his tail curling around taloned pedes.

“Hmm--I have never heard that your cohort was particularly inclined towards such studies, however,” Steeljaw replied. “And yet all of you have been mewed away with your new … acquisitions … for almost an orn.” He lifted a forepede, inspecting the golden surfaces on the underside with pointed unconcern. Even the undercurved parts of his talons had been expertly buffed. “My experience is that humans can be quite unpredictable, both in behavior and in their choice of companions. If yours require additional human contact, perhaps that is something I can assist with?”

Ravage chuffed, a disdainful venting of air. “Your offer is quite … convenient. Are you sure it is not intended for the benefit of your humans, rather than ours?” A bladeframe’s faceplates were not as mobile as those of other frametypes, but Ravage managed to convey his skepticism with an artful lift of a brow-ridge, the faintest baring of silvered fangs. “Or did you think we wouldn’t discover that one of our humans is a creator-female?”

“If you think we will let your humansss in just so they can try to breed with ourss, you are very much misstaken,” Erasure added, the razored scales along his backstruts lifting slightly in warning, sparking slightly with charge. Out of sight of the pickups, Ratbat’s squirming and squeaking intensified as static charge crackled through the air and across his plating.

Steeljaw’s optics widened, and he dropped all pretense of disinterest. “No--no, that’s not what we--” He stopped short, shaking his sensor-bladed mane as if trying to rid himself of the very idea. “We just want to make sure she’s okay. That’s all.”

Ravage said nothing, letting the silence stretch.

Squirming, Steeljaw finally said, “Look, I won’t lie and say that they wouldn’t be interested in interfacing. But you have my word that Ra--none of our humans would ever do anything with her that she didn’t want.”

“Hmmph,” said Erasure doubtfully.

“You may ask our creator-human if she desires the company of her kind.” Ravage decided at last, giving the other bladeframe a long look.

Steeljaw hesitated. “You have my thanks. But I must inquire: your human has… learned to use a datapad for calls? Already?”

Erasure curved his long forebody in an elegant arc, amber optics glinting. “Sshe hass… yet, you sstill dessire accesss to Ausstinite tower, do you not? We have the information. It isss very ssenssitive, however.”

Steeljaw did his best to keep his expression from showing either on faceplates or field at what the serpentframe implied. It was one thing to bargain with a junior member of a cohort; quite another to arrange for an in-person datashare with its First. Especially this First. *Extra* especially the First of this notorious cohort, with all the rumors surrounding its many and very ... unusual arrangements. Not the least of which involved Erasure himself, part of another cohort, and yet apparently as comfortable in this one’s quarters as if he were being actively courted.

“The optimal care and feeding of humans can be quite complicated,” Steeljaw said slowly, on a sudden hunch, “and we have made a number of observations which can improve on the standard plan.” It wasn’t much, in exchange for highly restricted data. Or at least, it wouldn’t have been a tempting trade for most cohorts.

“Such as?” Ravage asked, his expression one of studied disinterest.

“For example, our humans uncovered a method of combining glucose syrup with nutritive cubes, which they enjoy a great deal,” Steeljaw said. He might not understand the sticky, caramelized, pudding-like result, but he definitely understood the organics’ expressions of unadulterated delight.

“Recipess?” Erasure arched an elegantly-sculpted optical ridge. “You wish to trade us recipess for--”

“Hey Steely! Oh wow, it really is you!” Sharp black talons closed over the rim of the datapad, obscuring the feed from several of the cameras. “Long time no see! Whatcha been up to? Is your carrier still talking his way into everywhere he shouldn’t be in Kalis?” Another narrow, wedge-shaped helm popped down into the visual field as the datapad tried to focus. “I noticed that Ravage had just booked a transport pod, but I never thought it’d be you! Wait until I tell Rainy--it’s gonna be great to have you here. We can all go out, swap some memories, find ourselves a party or three, just like the old days--”

“Stealing my calls halp,” squeaked Ratbat breathlessly from somewhere under Erasure’s coils.

“Buzzsaw--” Ravage growled. Buzzsaw tilted his helm, scarlet optics flickering in surprise at his cohort-mates’ obvious exasperation.

“Whaaat? Why are you looking at me like that? It’s just Steeljaw. We saw the booking notice go out, so I figured I’d come see who was visiting. And it wasn’t even my idea--Frenzy was just checking up on the suite’s data traffic, so it’s not my fault!”

Steeljaw was too experienced a negotiator to smile, but his amusement rippled through his field. “Hey, Buzzsaw--good to see you too. I’m definitely looking forward to it, so long as Ravage doesn’t decide to change his mind.” He slanted the other bladeframe an arch look.

“Nah, he won’t change his mind. We’ve been wanting to-erk!” Lightning-quick, the tip of Erasure’s tail lashed out, coiling around Buzzsaw’s beak. Clamping it shut, he yanked the flightframe’s helm downward, out of range of the pickups. “Mmrrph!” For a moment, all that could be seen in the jostled viewscreen was a tangle of wings, talons, and lashing tail. Then Ravage shouldered to the fore, ignoring the muffled squeaks and the scrape of metal against metal behind him with an air of long practice.

“We will provide the information you requested, in exchange for these recipes. And for the promise of future in-depth interviews with no fewer than five of your humans, to be chosen by us. Said interviews will last at least one joor each, and will happen within one human ‘year’.” Sensory spines arched forward expectantly as Ravage regarded the other bladeframe. “Do you accept?”

Steeljaw hesitated. “We don’t actually own any humans, you know. We just know … other mecha who work with them extensively.”

Ravage gave Steeljaw a skeptical look. “Are you trying to claim that Blaster would be unable to fulfill these terms? Surely there is good reason your carrier is known as the Voice of Kalis?”

“Of course! Blaster can talk anyone into anything,” said Steeljaw indignantly. “But the humans--well, things get complicated, and I cannot speak for them. They might not want to talk to your cohort.”

“Let us worry about that. Do we have a deal?”

Steeljaw considered the dark bladeframe a bit, obviously thinking. And most likely consulting with his cohort on the side. “ … very well. We have a deal.”

“A sshuttle pod will meet you at the Kaliss Riftsss, dock nine nine three four,” Erasure added, snaking his head unsteadily back into the visual field. Keeping two fractious symbionts pinned while carrying on a conversation wasn’t easy, judging by the now-doubled squeaking and thrashing coming from just outside the viewscreen, despite the ample coils Erasure had at his disposal. “Don’t be late. Unlesss you want to arrange your own transssport? Of coursse, you would need to let your carrier know where you were going, if you--”

“Eeep eep inefficient eep!” With a final valiant burst of effort, Ratbat levered himself free of Erasure’s pale constriction and shot free, slippery as a lubricated petrorabbit. “My caaalllll!” Cackling squeakily, the royal purple bat flailed his way straight up Ravage’s shoulder and onto the viewscreen, pedes-first. The visual feed went tumbling over as the long-suffering datapad finally gave up and clattered from its holder, hit a corner, spun -- and went straight off the edge of the table.

Steeljaw blinked, nonplussed.

Static crackled across the visual feed, and then resolved into… a view from the floor, looking up at the edge of the workbench. Three symbiont helms poked over that edge, blinking down at him with varying expressions of surprise and dismay. Ratbat streaked past in the background, ranting like some elemental force of high-pitched irascibility, wings thrashing in so many directions at once it was a wonder he stayed airborne.

“Oh, I’ll be there on time,” said Steeljaw, paw hovering over the disconnect toggle on his end of the link. He smiled slowly, a luxurious flex of golden plating. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

 

 

*****

 

It took five days -- as near as Maggie could figure, anyway -- to get enough parts connected properly and working. The jumble of workstations now stretched the full length of her table, with parts left over for more modifications that she hadn’t gotten to yet.

Just like the past couple of mornings, she’d spent the first part of the day with calculus. Or at least, she was pretty sure this stuff was calculus -- it hadn’t exactly been part of the offerings at the local school. Probably the enclaves had people who taught things like integrals, differentials, u-substitution, multivariable forms, and maybe even more, but it sure hadn’t been anything she’d been privileged enough to learn.

Soundwave’s symbionts, at least, didn’t seem to care about keeping any of their tech a secret--they happily provided a wealth of information on anything she asked about, from nanites to local astronomy to how their internal systems worked. It was both fascinating and incredibly frustrating, because every time the symbionts showed her something useful they ran into yet *another* thing that no one had ever thought to teach her. To be fair, the knowledge probably didn’t even exist outside of the Enclaves anymore, beyond perhaps a few dusty, moth-eaten books squirrelled away and forgotten. There wasn’t a whole lot of use for quadratic equations during lambing season, after all.

But now, free of the mind-numbing drudgery of farm work and with an overabundance of information at her fingertips, Maggie found herself not even knowing where to start. One class of nanites, for example, communicated entirely in variants of sine waves, but frankly she had only the foggiest notion of what a sine wave even was, and had no idea at all how to calculate trigonometry functions or fourier transformations. So they’d had to back up and learn all of that. The symbionts were patient enough, but sometimes she got the impression that they were taken aback by her ignorance. Either that, or by how long it took her to grasp hatchling-level math skills--she wasn’t sure which. And on top of that, she could only learn math for like, eight or ten hours at a time before her brain just … overloaded, and she started making mistakes.

Maggie scrubbed her hands roughly through her hair, digging fingertips against her scalp in frustration. “I’m so close--I got it all working, but I just don’t understand *why* it works!”

“I wasn’t suggesting that you quit,” said Patchjob gently, patting her back, “But maybe take a little bit of a break for a few joors, and focus on something else? These terminals are useful for more than displaying information, you know. How about the scanner bed you set up yesterday?”

Maggie blew out a long breath. Then, squaring her shoulders, she saved the vector field she’d been working on and waved it away, feeling as if she were shaking a weight off her shoulders. There’d be time to pick it all back up again -- later. “OK … maybe you’re right. But doesn’t the scanner just digitize a picture of whatever’s on it?”

“It does, but it does a lot more than that too.” Raindance rolled over onto her side, floating effortlessly in the air about a meter from the tabletop, wingtips wiggling in thought. Maggie’d been freaked out by her at first; the robot looked something like a cross between a tiny jet, a manta ray, and a flying carpet. Raindance was two meters long from nose to tail, navy on top and a blue that practically glowed on her underside. Hearing a voice like Maggie’s, even an *accent* like Maggie’s, from such a creature had been beyond strange at first. Maggie was pretty sure that Raindance wasn’t a girl--did the aliens even have girls?-- but she sounded like one, and didn’t seem to mind the pronoun, and so now it was impossible for Maggie to think of Raindance as anything but a ‘she’. “You can see individual molecules and atoms, so I guess you’d call it an electron microscope? Do you like carbon chemistry?”

Maggie winced at yet another gap in her education. “Uh … I’m not sure?” At least she knew what carbon was, right?

“We should find out, then!” said Raindance, pinging her carrier a quick request for an interpretation module that’d make the scanner’s output understandable to a creature without dataports. Soundwave obligingly wrote the app and remotely fed it to the scanner. “Ok, what do you want to look at?”

Raindance floated over to the remains of Maggie’s breakfast. “What about this?”

“I guess so?” She honestly wasn’t sure if she wanted to know exactly what she’d been eating all this time, but it was probably better to test the scanner on something that wasn’t a body part. At least until she knew more about how it worked. “What are we looking for?”

Picking up a bit of leftover food block with one of her funny long pincer-things, Raindance floated back over to the scanner, setting it down on the glass plate on the top. “We can look for anything you want, really.”

Trotting over, Patchjob switched on the machine, which came to life with a barely audible hum. “You told us that you would like more variety in your fuel. Maybe we can figure out how to make it more palatable for your organic receptors?”

“We can do that?” Now that was something Maggie was interested in! Moving up to where Patchjob was, she peered at the squashed bit of food cube. “So if I remember what Buzzsaw said … that’s the scan-plate, right? And to scan, I dial it in with these, and then hit this button?”

“Close,” Raindance said cheerfully. “You have to set the scan parameters first. Otherwise it’ll try to pick up anything in the air over the plate as well.”

“Right, I remember. Show me how to do that again?” The ever-agreeable Patchjob was more than happy to help, delicately clawed digits dancing over the alien machine’s controls as he showed her which ones needed to be set. The readouts--what few of them there were--had originally all been in spiky, angular Cybertronian script, as complicated as a puzzle-box and twice as impossible to read. But her little mob had fixed that first thing, and now English words glowed in the center of the hollow frames that served as screens --even if half of them were unfamiliar terms for concepts she’d only barely begun to grasp.

Checking her settings one more time, Maggie hit the start button, and watched, fascinated, as the glass plate began to glow. A flicker of rainbowed light, almost too fast to see, passed through the cube--and an alien landscape of oddly textured mountains made of elongate ball bearings, threaded through with brightly colored swaths like a heaped-up pearl necklace on multicolor strings, sprang to life in the air.

“Wow …” she breathed, lifting her hands to cup the knobby image that hung before her. The confusing jumble of colored shapes looked solid as anything, but her fingers passed right through. “Is that really what my food looks like?”

“Yup. Pretty basic carbon arrangements, really,” Raindance said, looking the image over with a critical air. “Proteins, complex carbohydrate chains… it’s not among my foci, but from what I’ve been told, it’s fairly standard fuelstock for carbon-based life.”

“I usually deal with nitrogen chemistry; this has a lot of carbon. But over here--” Patchjob pointed out a pale-colored streak on one of the mountainsides. The display obediently drifted closer, the colors dancing over Maggie’s fingers, until the streak resolved into a complex bundle of whorling balls, linked together by dots that zoomed so fast between them, they looked like strings. “That one’s a bioflavonoid particular to your planet. There’s a whole class of similar compounds, some xanthones, some anthocyanidins. Uhm, let’s see here… it looks like they make up half a percent of your fuel. Food.”

“What’re they for?” Maggie furrowed her brow, trying to think back to tenth-grade chemistry, which was far as she’d been able to get at the school in her hometown. As usual, she turned up absolutely nothing. Bloomin’ elementary education, crikey. Of course, kids these days probably didn’t even get that.

“Well, the notes I found about your fuel say that they prevent oxidation of the cholesterol and other small triglyceride globules in your circulatory system,” Patchjob said, sitting back on his tail. “Maybe you’ve evolved to use them in other ways, too, but, uhm… it might be kind of rude to take one of you apart in order to find out, right?”

“Damn straight. No taking anyone apart,” Maggie said, jabbing a finger at him, unsure what a triglyceride was. Or oxidation, for that matter, although rust came to mind for no reason she could place. “Although… is there any way to take this apart? I mean, all these different bits probably taste different. Like… is there any salt in here?”

“Halide salts? Several.” Patchjob blinked. “Here’s potassium chloride, magnesium chloride, sodium chloride, potassium iodide…” All the ball-clusters he pointed out were small in comparison with the big ‘bioflavanoid.’

So many kinds of salt! “Right mate, I can work with that.” It all must be edible, or else it wouldn’t be in the food cube in the first place -- probably. She hoped. “Can you get me, like, little jars of each of those, and all the other things in here, to taste?”

“Sure!” Patchjob perked up. “It will take a bit of time, because there are a couple thousand different compounds in there, but we can start from the top and work down! I know that Glasswing would love to help as well, but it’ll take him a joor or so to get back, so we can get started without him. Come on, there’s a dispenser in the main room!”

“Uh, alright,” said Maggie, going over to sweep the morsel of food cube off the scanner. The image fizzled as she popped the bit into her mouth. “Glasswing? Another big mech?”

“No, another symbiont, one of us,” Raindance reassured her as he gamely floated along, aware of how little Maggie liked full-size mecha.

Maggie managed a thoughtful ‘hunh’ around the bite of food, then swallowed. “Really? I thought I’d already met all ten of you. Err, there were ten, weren’t there?” Ravage had told her that, she was pretty sure.

“Uhm,” said Patchjob, clutching at his tailtip as he padded along on his two short back feet. “Well, that’s kind of complicated…”

“Complicated?” Maggie let Patchjob and Raindance lead the way. She was getting better at navigating the huge spaces the alien robots lived in, but the symbionts knew all the best paths and shortcuts, especially for someone her size. Which, in this case, was a matter of trotting along the table’s edge for a few feet before hopping onto a strategically positioned, mini-mecha-sized lift. The lift took them up, rather than down, dropping them off at a wide ledge. Patchjob used it, trotting confidently into a vented opening that led to ductwork which apparently connected the two rooms. From there it was a hop, skip, and a jump--literally--down to the counter where the dispenser waited.

“Well …” Patchjob actually looked a little bit nervous. As nervous as an alien robot goanna could look, anyway.

“Glasswing isn’t part of our cohort,” Raindance put in smoothly. “He belongs to Crosswise.”

“Who’s Crosswise?” Maggie asked, settling cross-legged to watch intently as Patchjob began pulling open a panel on the front of the dispenser. “Another carrier?”

“Yes. He is a …” Raindance paused, obviously searching for the right words. “A sibling-creation to Soundwave, and works closely with him.”

It took Maggie a moment to parse that. “Wait, he’s Soundwave’s *brother*? You guys have brothers and sisters?”

“In a way,” Patchjob said, squinting at a particular bit of circuitry. “If two or more mecha are sparked and framed together by the same creator, then I suppose that would be an accurate description.”

“Huh, so you guys have families too. And you live together? Do all mecha do that, or just carriers?” Maggie asked, turning the concept over in her head. Alien robot families. It was an odd thing to imagine. Did that mean there were alien babies? Or were they born--or built--full-grown? Distracted by the idea, it took Maggie a moment to realize Patchjob had tensed up again, spinal plating flaring.

“Oh, Crosswise has his own quarters, near ours,” Raindance said, “but his symbionts hang out here a lot. I think you already met one of two of them on your way over.”

Maggie frowned, trying to think back. Patchjob clutched at his tail again and turned from the dispenser to look up at her with big round optics. “Other mecha do live together, sometimes, but -- it’s sort of an unusual arrangement for carriers. They’re usually pretty territorial, you know?”

“Uh, no, I didn’t know. Territorial over… what? And what are those pipes for? Can you show me how to start with the, uhm, the salts?”

“Sure -- oh those? Those are extruders. I’m setting them for multiplexed delivery,” Patchjob replied, talons tapping nervously over the controls. Right before Maggie’s eyes, a line of a dozen little cubes solidified across the shelf-like front of the machine. The tiny, clear-walled cubes seemed just like the ones she’d seen mecha drink their pink liquid from, except that each one was maybe a quarter of a liter in volume, rather than twenty. “And carriers, well--it’s their function, you know? It goes right to their core coding. So they can’t really help being overprotective, sometimes... “

“Er--ok?” Maggie blinked at Patchjob, now completely confused. She arched a brow as the extruder pipes split like spreading fingers before each swiveled into position and began pouring neat streams of fine white or yellowish powder to sprinkle into each of the tiny cubes. “Sorry, not following.”

“Carriers are territorial about their symbionts,” Raindance put in smoothly, her voice rich and amused. “A carrier’s rank mostly comes from the status and age of the symbionts in their cohort, and their core coding tells them to protect--and possess--as many as they are able. For particularly high-status symbionts, this can mean other carriers will try to court their affections, or lure them away. Which means that carriers can be touchy.” Raindance wiggled her wingtips in a manner that Maggie interpreted as a resignedly amused shrug.

“So …. you’re all like his harem? Or herd? And Soundwave--your carrier--is like the herd stallion or something?” Maggie said, frowning. She’d heard of such things happening in the Enclaves, among particularly wealthy men … and every once in awhile, women. When these arrangements were mentioned by outside folk, it was always with a mix of both scorn and envy. Most farmholders counted themselves lucky if they produced enough to provide for one wife and any surviving children.

Raindance laughed, an oddly human-like sound. “No, no--he doesn’t keep us around to spark new mecha. We’re his cohort, and he’s our carrier. We store and protect knowledge, and our carrier protects us, cares for us.”

“But Crosswise and Soundwave have been close for so long, they don’t mind when Crosswise’s symbionts stay with us, or when we stay with them,” Patchjob added, obviously trying to defend Soundwave--though from what, Maggie couldn’t tell. “Sometimes we even dock together. It’s--other mecha will say that’s not, uhm, exactly proper, but we are all happy this way, so why not? It’s a… a good arrangement for all of us. And... sometimes other symbionts also visit, because they’ve heard about Soundwave.“

Maggie’s eyes widened as the pieces finally came together. “Blimey -- you’re telling me that your mob are all swingers?”

“Swingers?” Raindance asked, floating over to the dispenser, where she unfolded a long, jointed pincer and grasped one of the filled cubes. “What would we swing from?” Raindance pivoted as if to scan for promising girders or other handy ceiling features.

“Uhm,” said Maggie, rescuing the clear-sided cube before it spilled. The white powder inside glittered like nanites, virtually indistinguishable from any of the other white powders inside the other cubes. It was heavier than a half-cup of water would have been. Were they all different? “It’s another slang term. It means that you have more than one, ah, partner. For sex, I mean. And people usually think that’s pretty strange -- you have to worry more about diseases. Plus you gotta have enough food for everyone, and that’s pretty tough.” She licked a fingertip, and cautiously pressed it to the powdery surface.

“Most mecha have more than one partner,” said Patchjob, the fine plating of his brow furrowing in a way that he had to have picked up from her. “But I’m not sure that what we do is really analogous to sex, since it’s not for reproduction, and contagions aren’t really a problem as long as you keep your ICE routines updated.”

“It might be culturally analogous, though,” Raindance said thoughtfully, rolling over onto her back midair. “The files say that humans pairbond, so anything outside that norm might be socially discouraged?”

“So this thing you guys have going on is, erm, socially discouraged?” Maggie asked, gingerly licking the white powder off her fingertip. It didn’t taste like table salt, more… neutral, and kind of clean and familiar somehow. A lot like the water in the warm mineral spring over on the edge of the township, now that she thought about it, except without the sulfur. Could she use this stuff to soak sore muscles? And why was it in her food? “Why tell me, then?”

Patchjob paused in the middle of reaching for another little cube for her to sample. “Well, you live here now, right? So you’re going to see all Crosswise’s symbionts, and Crosswise, and maybe other people, and uhm. It occurred to me that you might see things, is all.”

Maggie shrugged. “Well, as long as you guys are happy, that’s what matters. I won’t say anything if you don’t want me to.” She accepted the next proffered little cube of white powder and tasted it as well. Definitely something different, bitter and earthy. Sort of like the salt substitute her Da was supposed to eat for his blood pressure, but didn’t, because you could only get it from the enclave commissary. If she was going to be tasting a thousand of these, it’d be way too easy to get it mixed up with the others. “You got a piece of chalk, or something I could use to write on these? Also, what did you mean, dock together?”

Both symbionts looked kind of relieved -- or at least Patchjob did, and Raindance’s wings kind of relaxed -- though Maggie wasn’t sure why. “Sure, let me just tell the dispenser--” a few taps, a quick conference in Cybertronian between Patchjob and Raindance, and then Patchjob was handing Maggie something that looked like a pen with weird glass bulbs the size of a fingertip on each end. But it did leave orange marks on the sides of the little clear cubes, so, good enough.

“Docking is what happens when we link our systems to Soundwave’s, and fold up inside his chest compartments,” added Raindance, just as Maggie was testing her new pen.

“Whaaat?” Maggie’s new writing implement left a jerky, burned-looking streak on the side of the cube, and she nearly spilled the not-salt. “You mean-- he’s hollow inside? But you’re too big!” Eying them both, she tried to imagine it, and failed. “And pointy. How do you even fit? Wouldn’t that hurt?” Especially a symbiont like Ravage. How did that even work, with all those sharp edges? It sounded about as appealing as cramming a cactus where the sun didn’t shine.

Patchjob and Raindance exchanged bemused glances. “That surprises you, but sharing carriers doesn’t?”

“Well, maybe sharing is strange to you guys, but humans get up to all sorts of weird configurations that way. If there’s a way to, er, interface, someone’s probably done it already,” Maggie admitted. Of course, that tendency also got humans in trouble; as proved by her current position as ‘pet’ and occasional sex toy for giant alien robots. Pushing that thought away, she continued, “But, er, docking--that’s just engineering stuff. And Soundwave is big, sure, but you’re saying he fits TEN of you inside him? How the hell does he manage that?”

“Very carefully?” Raindance replied cheekily, and pivoted playfully in the air when Maggie glared at her.

“Soundwave’s capacity is really unusual,” Patchjob added proudly, obviously happy to brag about his carrier. “I have never heard of another carrier who was framed for ten. Most modern carriers can only support four or six; maybe one percent can take eight. But Recast--Soundwave’s creator--said that Soundwave was determined, even as a mechling. Nothing else would do.”

Trying to imagine a baby Soundwave -- in all his crazy-cat-lady-assassin-hacker glory -- was making her brain hurt, so Maggie went back to her original question instead. “But still-- you’re heavy, and ten of you… how d’you all fit? That’s gotta be crowded in there.” Not to mention uncomfortable; like ten joeys all in one mama kangaroo’s pouch, claws and feet sticking out everywhere.

“We transform, of course,” Raindance said easily. At Maggie’s blank look, she added, “that’s right, you probably haven’t seen that yet. We can shift our frames into a more compact configuration, which can dock and link up with Soundwave’s systems.”

“Hunh. I’d like to see that,” Maggie said, scribbling some hasty notes on the side of the cube. Then, remembering her previous experience at suggesting things to Sundor, she added, “but not just now. Maybe later--we gotta finish up this first.”

Patchjob burbled an amused sound, as he reached for more little cubes. “We can surely try, anyway! Here, let’s see what you think about this one?”

The next cube of powder was yellow-tan, and tasted like the inside of the traveling doc’s burn cabinet smelled, and Maggie dutifully marked the side of the cube with her impressions, for all the good that did her. But the fourth little cube, white this time, was unmistakeable. “This is salt!” Maggie gasped, delighted, rolling that familiar savory taste across her tongue.

Patchjob cocked his head. “They’re all salts.”

“Yeah well, maybe, but-” Maggie frowned, trying to think of a way to explain table salt -- the way it was evaporated at the coasts and then brought in by mule or sometimes truck, the rare years when salt was less expensive and everyone pickled vegetables and tough cuts of pork until they were meltingly delicious, and even after the pickled things were gone you could still use the liquid to flavor stew or dip bread….

“Oi!” chirped Raindance, suddenly diving away from the little group with an abrupt barrel roll. Patchjob perked up as well, head tilted as if to hear better.

“What is it?” Maggie said, suddenly uneasy.

“Uhm, well. Yanno how I said that other symbionts sometimes visited?” Patchjob said, clutching at his tailtip. He chittered something over at Raindance in a high-pitched squeal of Cybertronian.

“Whoops, I forgot that you’re not as fast as us!” Raindance floated back to them, rising up to hover just off the counter. “Our friend just landed; he’ll be arriving at the complex soon. We should go meet him. Climb on!”

“What the - who is - climb *on you*?” Maggie managed.

“Sure!” Raindance wriggled her wingflaps and tailfins, as if to demonstrate what nice hand-and-foot-holds they’d make. Frankly, they looked just as slippery as every other part of the impeccably waxed symbiont. “I can fly with Flipsides; you’re not that heavy!”

Oh great, her weight again. Maggie grit her teeth. “But--”

“Plus, it’s just over eleven, uhm, kilometers to the foyer if we stick to the main hallways, and I think your gears max out around seven kilometers a joor, so--”

“Alright look, I’m not really as worried about the distance *to* anything, as I am about the distance *above.* Above the damn floor, to be precise.” It’d been almost ten days, but Maggie still had plenty of reminders of the danger of falling. The bruises under her jacket -- the most recent version of which still looked an awful lot like a lab coat, though at least she now had trousers -- had blossomed from red welts into broad green and purple swaths. Everything had pretty much quit hurting, but she had bruises in places she didn’t even remember falling on, which had to be a new record or something.

Also, eleven bloody kilometers to the front door? Jesus. How big *was* this place?

“Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall. Plus I’ll stay super low to the ground,” Raindance said reassuringly, settling her undercarriage onto the tabletop. “You’ll be able to reach down and touch it anytime, I promise. I know how fragile organic frames are.”

Raindance’s wing- and tail-sections tapered smoothly into her somewhat thicker central… body portion. With flaps at each wingtip folded down to touch the table as well, she looked pretty stable. Still, the overall impression was one of delicate artistry, and Maggie definitely didn’t want to hurt the manta-ray-like robot. “So what, I just… sit on your back?”

“Yep! Flipsides does. Rumble doesn’t like flying for some reason,” Raindance said, sounding accommodating but a touch bewildered, like someone had told her they didn’t like cold well water on a muggy, hot day.

“So going to regret this,” Maggie muttered, and then raised her voice. “Alright: no rolling over, no fancy moves. Just flying,” she said, kneeling down gingerly to press one hand in the middle of Raindance’s back.

“Just flying, that’s all!” Raindance agreed.

Maggie leaned in a bit, cautious about putting too much weight on those smooth wings and back. But there was no shifting or give, just solid, warm plating. Carefully, Maggie shifted her hip onto the symbiont, alert for any sign or sound of distress. But Raindance just waited patiently, as Maggie arranged herself cross-legged on the symbiont’s back.

“Okay,” Maggie started, looking around for something to hold onto. “Now what do I--”

Raindance lifted up. The ride was so smooth, Maggie almost didn’t realize they were moving until they were a few centimeters off the table, like how she imagined it might feel to ride a flying carpet. A metal flying carpet, with kind of a domed top. Erm, so maybe not really like a flying carpet, after all… but then, what else could she compare this to? Maggie sucked in a breath as her new ride drifted a little ways forward and then back again, like Raindance was getting a feel for her weight.

“Oh, this is going to work just great!” Raindance said, sounding pleased. “Ready?”

“Ready -- I --?” Maggie started, looking up from the drifting tabletop to the other symbiont’s happy expression. “Just a second, how are you going to keep up, Patchjob? I mean--” Patchjob… seemed to be drifting sideways. Or no, rather, she was.

Patchjob chirred in amusement, faceplates folding upwards in broad-muzzled smile. “Don’t worry--I’m faster than I--” he started.

The edge of the table was a whole lot closer than it should have been. “Wait--!” But then Maggie was out over the edge, nothing between her and a fall except for Raindance’s suddenly too-small back.

Maggie panicked. Her hands, seemingly of their own accord, scrabbled at Raindance’s smooth wing surfaces, fingers latching hard into slippery-smooth vents as if that might stop her from sliding off. Not that Raindance was trying to buck her off--quite the opposite. Her broad backplates were solid beneath Maggie’s hands and knees, the symbiont hovering effortlessly in place. But that didn’t make the sheer drop where those backplates ended any less intimidating; the top of the table was at average alien-robot-waist-height, which meant they were almost four meters or so in the air. If she slipped and fell--well, maybe she’d only break a few bones. If she was lucky. “Raindance, don’t--I can’t hold on--” Sweat-slick fingers scrabbled for a better handhold as she instinctively flattened herself on her perch.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Raindance replied, trying to soothe Maggie’s fears. “We’re going down, see? I won’t let you fall.” Dusk-blue wings shifted, fine plating along the top and trailing edges reconfiguring so that the texture seemed somehow rougher to her grasping fingers as they gently sank downward, until they were barely a few feet above the floor. “Is that better?”

Maggie inhaled shakily, trying to push away the shakiness of her arms and calm her racing heart. Patchjob was half way down the climbing rungs set into the side of the table, claws hooked into each depression and descending headfirst. He was watching her with concern. Maggie swallowed. “I guess--but don’t go any higher than this, okay? And--where should I hold on to?” She didn’t want to grab anything important--or worse, sensitive.

“Well, those vents you’re hanging onto might get a little warm if we go faster, but--here.” Raindance unlimbered both ‘arms’. The multi-segmented, reversible-jointed limbs with blunted, clawlike ends resembled insect legs more than anything human. Luckily they were more flexible than a human’s, as well, as the symbiont folded them forward and up, so that they poked up on either side of Raindance’s... well, shoulders, for lack of a better word. In any case, the clawlike manipulators were well within Maggie’s reach. “Will holding onto my hands help?”

“I--maybe?” It was better than nothing, at least--edging forward, Maggie reached out and grabbed Raindance’s ‘hands’. The pincer-tips clasped her own palms very gently, and Raindance waited patiently while Maggie re-seated herself. The symbiont’s strange arms looked spindly and delicate, but felt as solid as grabbing onto the frame of a tractor, with no give at all. “O-okay. Let’s do this.”

“Ok? Ok! Off we go!” Raindance called out, and accelerated smoothly. True to her word, she stayed low to the ground, gliding effortlessly over the flooring panels and the ridge of the doorframe like it was no trouble at all. Getting across the room, usually a five-minute walk, took maybe fifteen seconds, faster than riding a bicycle. The undersides of tables and various pieces of furniture ghosted past overhead.

Maggie craned her head around, trying to find Patchjob -- but he was keeping up without difficulty, running on all four legs with a slinky, side-to-side gait, the gears and tensors along his spine rippling with motion.

Then someone chirped the door open, and they were gliding out into the corridor, with all its vast archways and spaces, vertical walls stretching fifteen meters high, and hallways so long the ends seemed lost to distance, all metallic colors and moving metal. She got a glimpse of a window, opening onto strange lights and alien structures. They carved close around a corner, and Maggie gasped and tightened her grip as suddenly all she could see were a monstrous pair of bright green legs -- but then they were dodging around the heavy mechanical feet, darting between lightly, as swift and agile as a feather on the breeze.

Maggie gave a low whoop as the corridor opened up before them, clear of obstacles, all vaulted ceilings and huge cathedral doorways. She was… actually enjoying the ride. She’d never really thought about what flying was like, but now…. It felt like, like freedom, like Maggie was suddenly not too small, slow, or out of place in this strange metal world. She laughed aloud, adrenaline overriding her fear, and Raindance giggled. “See? This is fun!”

“Yeah, well,” Maggie said, craning her neck for a glimpse of Patchjob, who was keeping pace just a little behind. She faced forward again, and gave up trying to keep the smile off of her face. “OK, maybe it is, a little. Let’s go find your friend!”


End file.
